


You Quiet the Voices Inside My Head

by alexanderotis47



Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: Anxiety Attacks, Depression, F/F, F/M, Hide Big Bang 2018, M/M, Multi, Self-Harm, Suicide, Suicide Attempt, consensual sex scene, please read at your own risk, psychiatric ward, rape scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-22
Updated: 2018-09-27
Packaged: 2019-05-10 02:25:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 15
Words: 63,536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14728206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alexanderotis47/pseuds/alexanderotis47
Summary: After a failed suicide attempt, Hideyoshi lands himself into Anteiku Health Services Center. Hide just wants to just do whatever it takes to get the heck out here so he could get back to his life, maybe actually get the job done this time around. That is, until he sees Kaneki Ken, the infamous, dangerous and unpredictable patient that has been here since he was 13. When he saw him sitting in the corner of the dining hall, all alone; Hide swore that the world got a little bit clearer, a little bit more colorful, and for once Hide felt alive. For once he felt alive and felt happy to be alive. Maybe there was a reason why he didn't die that day...maybe Kaneki Ken was the reason why.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: To reiterate, this fic contains a rape scene, smut scene, self-harm, suicide attempts and ideation. Child abuse. This story has a lot of mature things in it and with the rating I expect you guys to have an idea what you’re getting into. This fic is set in a psychiatric hospital and while it doesn’t go into depth on every single mental illness presented in this fic, one-shots as well as the sequel will. Read at your own risk! Inspiration for this fic, as well as a few experiences are drawn upon my own experiences with mental illness, as well as my experience working in a mental health facility. Not everything presented here may follow true to how a mental health facility runs, it is a fanfiction after all, but I tried to stay true as much as I can. (Possible trigger warnings: Ch. 3 is where the rape scene lands, around the end. Ch. 9 is where the child abuse scene is centered around the most. Ch. 10 is the smut scene. Ch. 11 has extreme violence. Like I said, read at your own risk).
> 
> If you are feeling suicidal please get help, call 1-800-273-8255. Somebody does care about you, your life is worth living. Enjoy.

Patient 007299N01, Hideyoshi Nagachika arrived at the Anteiku’s Health Services center at 14:30. Staff has introduced the patient to his roommate Patient 006379N06, Nishiki Nishio and will continue to try and make the patient feel more at home at the institution. Patient is currently in his room, laying on his bed, sleeping towards the wall of his room and is on 15 minute checks. Patient will continue to be monitored. 

So this was what it was like to be in the “nut hut”, Hide thought to himself as he stared at the plain, white brick wall in front of him. The meager belongings he was allowed to bring were set near one corner of the room, one carry on and one duffle bag waiting to be unpacked, to symbolize that this was really happening. It hadn’t worked, even after all the precautions he had taken checking and rechecking the lethal dose he needed to end his mediocre life.

It wasn’t that it was miserable. He had enough food and shelter and then some for his manga collection, his software and books to learn different languages, and other hobbies that he’d picked up over the years. He found his life was boring, like he was just living every day in the same boring routine. He had friends, but he could never feel like he could be himself around them. He always had to wear a mask, to always conceal the numbness he felt under a bright smile and bubbly personality. He picked up random hobbies over the years in hopes that maybe it would spark some meaning in his life, but it never lasted long. If only he could’ve waited a little longer…if only he hadn’t forgotten that Rin planned on coming over to work on their project for biology…he would’ve been dead. He wouldn’t be here, stuck, and labeled like livestock.

He heard the door to his room open and he immediately closed his eyes, feigning sleep. Another staff member checking to make sure he hadn’t offed himself.  
Had it really been fifteen minutes? It felt like an eternity.

He waited until he heard the door close with a soft click before opening his eyes again. He sighed and thought about all the people he shared this ward with. He heard some stories about this hospital. None of them good. 

There were 24 wards in all. Each ward contained certain patients. He was in the 20th , one of the adult wards for the disturbed. The 13th ward was for the bigger nutcases that had to be behind steel doors and were only given their trays through a slot, so he heard. Other wards were assigned geriatric patients, adolescents, and addicts, like any other mental institution. If a patient lost it and couldn’t be controlled, staff would call a code and a bunch of nurses would show up to restrain the patient. If they still couldn’t get him controlled, that patient could be locked in a seclusion room, stuck in a restraining chair, or sent to ward 13. He heard from Nishiki that one of the patients on this ward was stuck in a room by himself, under 24/7 watch by a staff member. Apparently that patient had been in this hospital ever since he was 11 and while he was dangerous, he wasn’t dangerous enough to be moved to ward 13. What was his name again? Neki something? Whatever, he was sure he would be seeing him around soon.

During his stay in the loony bin he was expected to follow certain rules, especially since he was under suicide watch. He had to ask to use the bathroom and he had to leave the door open a crack for a staff member to peer through. This also included when he showered. He knew some dudes would be turned on at a female nurse staring at them when they were in their birthday suit, but Hide was not that type of person. It was embarrassing. It reminded him of all the things he took for granted, like the music on his cell phone. That was something he had to give up before being admitted and thinking about it still brought tears to his eyes.

He looked up towards the clock. 4 o’ clock. Two hours until they would be led down into the dining area for supper. He wasn’t hungry.  
What were they going to do to him? Were they gonna shove pills down his throat? How long would he have to stay here? What if he was forced to stay there forever? He felt a shiver run through him and gripped at his hair. He wouldn’t be able to take it, he couldn’t last without HIS music. Sure they had little mp3 players but he doubted their selection of music was anything like his was.

Shit. Calm down idiot, they’re watching you. Be cool. He forced himself to let go of his hair and released a long sigh. He felt the events over the last couple of days catch up to him and exhaustion began to seep into his bones, relaxing his tense muscles. Sleep and behave yourself, we’ll figure out a way to get out of here later. He sighed again, letting his breathing slow as he reached for the light blanket they gave him for his bed. It offered no comfort to him, the smell of bleach made him feel cold, it wasn’t at all like the smell of home, the smell of summer, pine needles, maybe a hint of citrus. Sometimes even sunflowers when he decided to bring some home, he had a strong affinity to those flowers, their petals circled around their brown centers made him feel like he brought sun itself within his home. Maybe that’s why his hair looked like them.  
He let his consciousness drift off into the land of sleep, feeling cold and numb, dreaming about nothing.

~  
“Yo Shittychika! Oi, you with the half assed hair dye job, wake up! It’s chow time,” an annoyed voice called out, pulling him from his sleep. Nishio Nishiki, a guy that was admitted because he had anger issues, apparently causing a lot of fights around the city with punks who messed with his territory. He had short, messy, curly brown hair, and glasses. He seemed to be a studious fellow, and although he had an attitude problem the blonde thought they could be friends. Nishiki made sure when they were out of the watchful eyes of the staff that he knew where his side of the room was and told him if he were so much as to cross into his territory he’d mess up his pretty boy face. In response Hide smirked playfully and wondered out loud if that meant Nishiki had a thing for men to which the other threatened to make him dickless. The blonde laughed nervously but promised to stay on his side.

~

The blonde jerked awake and took a look at his surroundings, confusion and fear taking over until he remembered where he was staying. Oh. Right. This wasn’t a dream. He sighed, rubbing the sleep from his eyes as he swung his legs over the side of the bed. He grabbed his black and yellow jacket, pulling it on as he followed the ever so cheery Nishiki out of their room to meet up with the rest of the patients at the unit’s entryway. A girl with short, raven hair swept over one eye narrowed her eyes at him, studying him. In response the blonde lifted up a hand, waving with a grin. There was a girl next to her with short, hazelnut brown hair who politely waved back. Next was a smug, fancy looking guy with short purple hair who stuck his nose up in the air when Hide looked at him, a shorter looking male…or at least Hide thought he was male, had purple hair as well only curlier. Hide felt a mysterious aura surrounding this one though. Could they be related?

Two staff members arrived, one of them had a bulbous nose and brown hair that was styled in a way that Hide thought made him look clownish, the other had long, sleek black hair and eyes that seemed to smile, though they seemed to hide something deep inside. The two of them led them down to the food court area which involved walking down a series of hallways within the hospital and taking many different turns that made Hide’s head spin as he tried to come up with a mental map.

“Alright dumb ass. Listen carefully because I’m only going to say it once. That chick up there that was glaring at you, that’s Touka, she’s here for sticking her fingers down her throat and shit. The chick by her is Yoriko, she’s here for being a crazy bi-“

The one named Touka turned at the mention of her friend’s name and began to glare daggers at Nishiki in warning.

“She’s a lovely person to be around, bi-polar disorder,” Nishiki quickly corrected himself at Touka’s gaze. Hide gave him a questioning look to which he answered, “Don’t piss Touka off, especially when it comes to Yoriko. I’ve fought with her a few times and she’s not one to mess with.”

“Pompous asshole #1, the taller one, is Tsukiyama Shuu, he has borderline personality disorder. The shorter one next to him is Karren von Rosewald, his cousin, as for what he has nobody knows, they’re thinking bi-polar. Lost his entire family in one fell swoop, can’t say I blame him for being so messed up,” the man explained with a sigh. He continued listing off names, why they’re here, none of which were the name Hide was mostly curious about.

As they finally reached the dining area, Hide finally asked his question, “What about that Neki guy?”

Hide didn’t miss the mass amount of eyes that turned to look at him when he mentioned his name.

“Kaneki Ken.” Nishiki said, his voice dropping as he jerked his head to the corner of the room to direct Hide’s attention to the small creature in the corner with pale, porcelain skin, married by jagged scars that went from his hands, up to his arms where they were hidden by his t-shirt. He had fluffy, pure white hair that made him stick out like a sore thumb in the area, his stormy gray eyes were fixed out the window. Tragically beautiful. He looked so young, like a lost child. The woman next to him was trying to coax him to eat. Hide stopped to stare at this beautiful, broken man, the usual numbness he felt deep inside began to warm and his chest began to ache. He didn’t know why but he felt so drawn to him, everyone around him disappeared and all he could focus on was him. He never felt like this, ever, in his life and it intrigued him and scared him at the same time. There was so much feeling going through him that he almost wished he could go back to feeling that cold, bland numbness again.

Hide was startled when someone snapped their fingers in front of his face.

“Oi wake up Shittychika, you only have a limited time to eat. Meet me over at the other corner of the room,” Nishiki snapped, glaring at everyone who was staring at Hide wondering what he was doing staying in the middle of the entryway like that. The blonde glanced back over at the man with scars, ignoring the crushing sadness weighing on his chest as he reluctantly made his way through the food line. It felt like some unseen force was desperately trying to pull him back to Kaneki Ken. What the hell was going on with him? He fought against it and made his way over to Nishiki with the questionable, carefully portioned food on his tray. Damn, even their diets were monitored?

The blonde sat down across from Nishiki, staring at his food in a mixture of disgust and confusion.

“It’s a lot better than it looks, trust me,” Nishiki responded, then he pointed his spoon over at Kaneki, “Okay, so that’s Kaneki Ken. He’s been here ever since I got here and even longer, some say since he was 11. He has almost everything in the book, or at least that’s what I heard, the kid is seriously fucked up. Schizophrenia, depression, self-harm tendencies, suicide attempts, anorexia, some people even speculate multiple personality disorder.”

“How’d he get that way? Do you know?”

“I’ll tell you as much as I know, but trust me, you don’t want anything to do with him. He’s a ticking time bomb waiting to go off at any moment,” Nishiki warned, sighing when he saw the blonde look over again at Kaneki, his warning falling on deaf ears.

“I don’t know much about what happened before him...but from what people have been saying this guy called Yamori, also known as Jason, had been admitted here and he is the reason why Kaneki’s here too. While Kaneki can get to be dangerous enough to be sent over to unit 13, he’s been kept here because if the two were to see each other all hell would break loose. Jason is a sadistic fuck, I’ve heard stories about him even before he was admitted here. He loved to torture anyone who was near him and he was creative in doing so. As for what he did to Kaneki, I’m not sure but I’ve heard rumors saying Kaneki was abducted from his house and then Jason took him back to his playroom to rape him, physically tortured him or psychologically tortured him, maybe all three or maybe even more. I don’t know for sure but knowing Jason, Kaneki is lucky to even be alive. Upon being admitted here, both Jason and Kaneki were injured, but Jason moreso. Some speculate Kaneki finally had enough and snapped. Since then he has never been the same,” Nishiki explained, the two of them watching as Kaneki began to fidget, his gray eyes widened in fear, fixed on the window in front of him.

“Well damn Nagachika, it might be your lucky day today…you ready to see what happens when someone loses their shit?” Nishiki asked, all sarcasm and jokes put aside as they watched the staff member with Kaneki attempting to calm him down before he escalated. Kaneki’s shoulders began to shake and he began to mumble to himself for a few moments, the staff member looked exasperated, looking around her for help. Then, just like as if someone slapped Kaneki across the face, he fell to floor. Hide’s blood ran cold when he heard the broken, shrill screams come out of such a small, frail body, and the way those tired, gray, sad eyes widened in fear broke his heart.

“Get it away from me! Pl-Please get it away from me! Don’t put it in my ear! Please,” the man shrieked, pleading as he covered his ears.

“Ken, you have to calm down,” the staff member who was with him the whole time said, sinking to her knees to be beside Kaneki as other staff approached the two of them. The woman reached out to Kaneki.

“Stupid bitch,” Nishiki cursed, wincing as the man only freaked out more, shoving the staff member violently away from him, looking like a scared, wild animal. That was enough for the other staff to take action to restrain Kaneki, two big, burly guys roughly grabbed Kaneki by each grabbing a shoulder and shoving him harshly to the ground. Hide winced visibly at the thud the smaller man’s body made against the hard tile of the food court. His arms were pulled back in a way that made Hide grimace and grab at his own shoulder where he knew beyond a doubt his muscles would be stretching uncomfortably. One of their meaty hands pushed his head to the ground while the other called from a sedative when he began to struggle more, horrific screams ripping themselves from his throat. Hide felt his nose flair angrily, they were going too far! They were clearly hurting him, where the hell were the staff from their unit at!? Just as Hide was about to jump out of his seat, he felt Nishiki grab the arm of his jacket and pull him harshly back, slamming him back against his seat.

“You fucking idiot, stay here! There’s nothing you can do now,” Nishiki said.

“But they’re hurting him, his face shouldn’t be pushed against the ground like that!” Hide said, his muscles tensed up and ready to pop back up out of his seat if Nishiki didn’t keep an iron grip against the sleeve of his jacket.

“Trust me, he’s been through worse and if you’re not careful you’ll end up like him. So stay,” Nishiki spat, looking down and away from the scene playing out before the eyes of the entire population of the food court. The brunette with glasses winced when he heard Kaneki begin to shriek out numbers, desperately, like shouting out those numbers would take everyone away and quiet the hell inside his head. Hide felt his heart sink when one of the men holding Kaneki’s head to the floor called out for a sedative. It was that moment Kaneki managed to turn his head over to where the two of them were sitting. Those red lines, fresh scratches marring his pale cheek in his struggle, those gray watery eyes locked on fiery amber, made Hide feel his heart had fallen from his chest and broke into a million pieces at his feet. No amount of super glue, sunflowers, or sunshine was going to chase away the way those gray eyes locked on his, screaming at him to help, threatening to pull him into the broken temple of the other’s mind.

Hide watched as one of the nurses came up behind Kaneki with a syringe in hand and with a quick practiced thrust of the arm, pierce the needle through the skin where his lower back met his hips. He watched as those choppy, fearful, gray pools turned into dull glass, they stared up at him in confusion before they were blanketed over by the man’s snowy eyelids. As they felt Kaneki’s form go limp in their arms, one of the male nurses lifted him up as if he were nothing more like a sack of potatoes and just like that, the chatter of the food court returned. Like nothing happened.

Yeah…maybe this was just an everyday occurrence to them, but in that moment Hide vowed that with every fiber of his being that he was going to make sure that this was the last time. This was the last time this would happen to Kaneki, this was the last time he would stare up with those fearful, confused, gray eyes, pleading for anyone or anything to help him. He will be there. He will help him. No matter what it took.

“Better hurry up and eat, we’re going to be going back soon,” Nishiki said, tearing Hide from his thoughts.

“I’m not hungry…”

“More for me then,” the man shrugged, pulling Hide’s tray over to his own to scavenge what looked edible, “Trust me, you’re not the only one who has felt that way. The first time is always a bit of a shocker for newbies. I’ve seen it happen tons and had it happen to me on more than one occasion. You don’t want to be on the receiving end, so behave.”  
“Couldn’t they have done something…I don’t know…less violent?” Hide asked before elaborating, “Like why wasn’t that lady giving him space? What did he mean by not sticking it in his ear? Why did he count down like that? He started at 1000 right? Subtracting seven.”

“The lady is a fucking idiot, not that I blame her. She’s only been here for a few months. Most end up leaving in six months. As for the other things he’s been screaming, I don’t have a definite clue. I’m guessing he must’ve had another hallucination that set him off…usually he screams about centipedes…the counting down thing I doubt is from a hardcore math tutor. Probably another thing Yamori implemented for entertainment,” Nishiki said in between bites of food.

“Where did they take him?”

“Beats me. Back to his room? Maybe shoved him in a restraint chair,” the man said, taking time to finally study the blonde before responding, “Don’t think too hard Shittychika. I know what you’re thinking but I’m telling you the only way you’re gonna get out of this place is through good behavior and acting like you give a shit about changing your ways.”  
Hide turned and glared at Nishiki before retorting, “How can you sit there and do nothing!? Did you see his eyes!? He was terrified! He wasn’t going to hurt anyone!”

“Yeah, I saw dumb ass, and I’ve seen breakdowns where he did hurt someone! If you want to throw caution to the wind, then that’s fine as long as you don’t drag me down with you. Unlike you, some of us have people to go back to and I’ll be damned if someone like you keeps me from getting the fuck outta here,” Nishiki spat, his grip tightening on the fork he held in his fist. Hide looked down at the fork which was trembling in the other’s grip. While he felt fear, he tried hard not to show it on his face. He had to remember Nishiki was his roommate and could beat the ever-loving shit out of him when the staff had their backs turned. Speaking of staff, the blonde could see out of his peripheral vision a couple of the males turned towards them, ready to break them apart if they decided to throw down in the food court.

Hide sighed dismissively and looked away from Nishiki, turning up his hand to prop his head up against it as he stared out the window. The gears in his head were already turning to come up with ideas on how he would approach Kaneki. How could he get the man to trust him?

“It’s time to go Shittychika,” Nishiki said after several moments of silence, his relaxing tone let Hide know that his anger had dissipated for now. The two of them stood up, depositing their empty trays on a conveyor belt before following the staff members who had led them all down to the food court. The blonde wondered if he would be able to catch a glimpse of Kaneki again before he retired back to his room for the rest of the night.

~

Hide was sad to find zero traces of the white-haired beauty when he returned to the unit with the rest of the patients. One of the staff members, some old guy on the unit, tried to urge Hide to stay out of his room by intensely encouraging him to join the rest of the patients for movie night out in the day room but Hide returned the favor by intensely refusing. The day room was basically this open area on the unit that contained a mini dining room, a small kitchenette (that only staff could go into) on one side, while the other side containing a T.V. with some cheap ass looking chairs. Towards the back would be the “nurses station” and the day room split off into two hallways, one hallway for men, another for females, each with an entrance to the unit at the end of the hallway.

Anyways, the blonde was content to just lay on his bed, staring at the same white wall, going through different scenarios in his head on how he would perfect his first meeting with Kaneki. He was content for a while until he realized the uncomfortable fullness of his bladder. He was surprised he even lasted this long, though he figured he was due to the reluctance of the inevitable walk down to the nurses’ station to ask one of the staff members to unlock the bathroom, walk him down there, and watch him take a piss essentially to make sure he didn’t try to kill himself. If my plan actually fucking worked I wouldn’t have to have someone watch my every movement and control when I went to the bathroom, when I ate, when I showered, when I slept or woke, Hide thought to himself bitterly as he pushed himself up into a sitting position.  
The blonde slowly walked down his hallway towards the nursing station, his usual face that was mostly devoid of emotion when he was alone was slowly being replaced by his façade he used to ward off people’s concern.


	2. Chapter 2

Over the next few days Hide was disappointed to find no sign of the white-haired beauty and for a moment he was afraid that they might’ve switched him over to a different unit. He’d done all he could within his limited environment and constricted routine to try and run into him. He spent more time around the other patients when he wasn’t busy with catching up with the homework he’d missed in college. The hospital was gracious enough to accommodate that aspect of his life for him within specific boundaries. Hide would’ve been grateful only if they didn’t force him to wake up so early in the damn morning to check his vitals (for he was a new admit), then walk down to a small room where he could watch his lectures online and complete his homework. On top of that a counselor had been assigned to him and he was to have two sessions a week on top of group sessions all while keeping up with his schooling. Fun.

“So Mr. Nagachika, why don’t you tell me a little about yourself,” a middle aged man with short black hair said, one of his legs crossed over the other. His name was Marude and he was assigned as Hide’s counselor during his stay at the hospital. His formal suit attire put Hide on edge and the way his already narrow eyes looked at him made him feel like the man was peering into his soul.

Hide took a look around the room, hoping that by some miracle something would jump out at him to talk about. He strongly did not want to talk about his feelings, especially to some total stranger that reminded him of an angry pitbull. He frowned slightly when he found nothing but blank white walls. There was a bookcase in one corner of the room containing college textbooks on an array of psychological topics, such as behaviorism, psychological counseling therapies, and Hide swore he saw something dealing with Freud in there. Great, this guy is gonna tell me I have some mother complex or pent up sexual frustration of some sort, he thought to himself. Behind Marude was a wooden desk where a laptop sat precisely in the middle, no doubt waiting to file Hide’s boring life story alongside all the other nutcases Marude dealt with.

The blonde forced a smile, deciding to give the man only a surface description of himself, “Well the name is Hideyoshi Nagachika, people usually call me Hide. I like to dabble in many things depending on what I’m interested at the time. I like to read manga and listen to music, music is like my oxygen. I’m a Gemini…uhhh so yeah…”

“What are you majoring in school?” Marude asked

“Foreign Language Studies, in English specifically,” Hide fired off.

Marude nodded faking interest, at least in Hide’s opinion before he asked his next question, “So how is school going for you? Anything particularly stressful bothering you.”

“Nah, I got it figured out. So do people usually tell ya you look like a pissed off pitbull?” the blonde questioned, feeling irritated at being probed. Marude frowned at that but responded professionally,“No. I think we should focus on you for right now. Based on the information we gathered you have a mother, father, and an older brother though they haven’t made direct contact to you during your stay at the ICU or your transfer here. Is there any stress in that area of your life?”

“Wow you guys work fast. No. There’s no stress. As much as I love your blank white walls, cheap hard chairs and barely edible food, I’d like to get back to my life now. Just point me to the nearest exit,” Hide chuckled, his irritation growing. He didn’t want to talk about his family and he didn’t want them to know about his recent mental breakdown.

Marude nodded and hummed thoughtfully, deciding to take a different route as if sensing the blonde’s growing irritation under his mask of humor and sarcasm. “What kind of music do you like to listen to?”

Hide hesitated at the topic change, although he felt relieved that it was switched to a topic he enjoyed to talk about, “Uhhh depends on my mood. Sometimes pop. Sometimes punk or alternative stuff. It sounds weird but I have fallen hard for the Backstreet Boys. More recently I listen to some Imagine Dragons, Of Monsters and Men, of course Fall Out Boy, Panic at the Disco, Death Cab For Cutie, Sleeping At Last and Radical Face. Blood on the Dancefloor at one point, not anymore because of the fucked up things they did to their fans. One Ok Rock I listen to at times.”

“Have you tried the music players behind the nurses’ station?”

“No. I don’t think they’d have the same music taste I had,” Hide sighed, feeling an ache begin to grow in his chest as he realized just how much he missed “his” music.

“That could be true. I know this isn’t the best experience you’ve ever had in your life but I think you should make the best of it. You are here for a reason,” Marude responded.

“Yeah because you guys deemed me as mentally insane,” Hide rolled his eyes.

“No, you’re not mentally insane. There are many people out there like you that are just going through a rough patch in their lives. There’s nothing wrong with that and there’s nothing wrong with getting help-“

“Yeah yeah yeah, BUT I was forced into this.“

“Through recommendations, through your doctor and parents. The information they provided me tells me that similar dysfunctions have occurred in the past, which we don’t have to get into today. You are here for a reason and while I can’t force you, I think it would be a good idea for you to let us help you,” the man said in a calm but firm voice that made Hide grit his teeth and look away. He was no longer smiling, his amber eyes were smoldering in rage. Half of his “dysfunctions” were purely because he was at the right place at the wrong time. Or maybe it was the wrong place at the wrong time. Either way luck was a total bitch to him in the past. Some of them were true, but he knew from his parent’s descriptions that they were only half true which led to Hide having poor relations with his parents and older brother.

Hide stayed silent and crossed his arms, deciding he would stay silent for the rest of the time and glare at the floor. He was thankful when Marude seemed to realize this and decided to cut the session short but not before saying, “Well your doctor decided that we’re going to start you on a low dose of anti-depressant to see if that helps anything. The nurse at the window on your unit will give you the pill once a day starting tonight. Think over what I said. I know that this place isn’t the most ‘lit’ place on earth but it’s a starting point to help you get better. See you in a couple days.”

He did not seriously just say lit, Hide thought to himself as he mentally face palmed. The blonde rolled his eyes before standing up, still seething inwardly as he was escorted back his unit. When he got there he quickly walked back his room before a staff member or Nishiki could question about the rage that threatened to bubble its way up his throat. He made his way over to his bed where he collapsed spread eagle with a huge sigh before turning over on his side in the fetal position to stare at the blank wall before him.

He wondered what his parents told them and if Marude believed their stories about him. If Marude did believe in his parents then Hide would be seen as nothing more than a young adult who was a delinquent, who had a wild imagination, a trouble maker. What was he thinking? Of course Marude would believe those stories. Why would he listen to someone who was placed in the hospital because he tried to overdose on sleeping pills? No doubt he’d bring her up, or his drunken escapades, or that incident when he was younger at the train station.

Hide curled up into a tighter ball, his hands finding his place on his head where they began to pull at the strands of his hair. A choked sob escaped his throat as images flashed in his mind. The way that man’s body looked when he stepped out in front of an incoming subway train, the metallic smell of blood and the air, the sound of his high pitched child-like scream. The way her hands roamed all over his body even as he tried to desperately twist away from her probing hands, the strong scent of alcohol and sweat that hung in the air, his pleas for her to stop. Then, when he kept avoiding and rejecting her since that night, her text, suicide note, and watching as her body descended back to earth…Akane…

It was his fault. He wasn’t strong enough…if only he’d let her have her way with him she’d be alive…

He felt tears stream down his face but all he could do was lay and stare at the wall, letting these images flash before his eyes, unaware that a staff member had opened his door to check on him again and witnessed his moment of weakness which would be charted and made available to Marude and the other nurses. They left without a word of comfort. Hide cried harder.

~

It was a couple of hours later when the blonde finally woke up from another dreamless sleep after exhausting himself. His eyes blinked open lazily to stare at the same old, white, brick wall, the ache in multiple areas of his scalp a reminder of what happened previously. He would’ve felt concerned and a little disappointed in himself if he hadn’t felt so numb and cold. He shivered against the bed and he wondered whether or not he should grab his yellow and black jacket to try and keep warm, though the room wasn’t particularly cold.

“Good morning sleeping beauty. Did you have a nice mental breakdown?” Nishiki called from his bed while reading a book. Hide responded by shoving his face further in the pillow.

“You know it’s kind of nice knowing you have other emotions other than being sickeningly happy all the time,” the man continued as he turned a page, “Do you usually shed that much hair after a breakdown?”

Hide removed his face from the pillow to look down to find several of his blonde hairs scattered across the pillow. He groaned and simply returned his head back to the pillow. It wasn’t like this was the first time this happened before and he had done a lot worst in the past. Nishio took his eyes off his book and finally looked over at the blonde but instead of his eyes narrowing in a sneer, the brunette seemed genuinely concerned for his roommate.

“Cheer up. Your boyfriend is gonna be at lunch today I heard, not a surprise, usually they give him three days of solitude before trying to reintroduce him to social settings after his freak outs.”

The blonde’s head shot up to look over at Nishio, finding himself to be suddenly full of energetic excitement, “He’s not my boyfriend! I just…well…”

I just want to see him laugh and smile. I want to see his gray eyes light up and I want to know all about him from his favorite color to what kind of thoughts keep him up at night. I want his opinion on whether or not pineapple should be on pizza, I want to know everything about him, Hide thought to himself, a light blush dusting his cheeks.

“Yeah, okay whatever. I don’t care what you do, just don’t drag me into man. Try offering him some black coffee or talking about books sometime. Shuu tried to do what you’re doing now in the past and it worked well…that is until he totally scared him off,” Nishiki said.

“How’d he scare him off?” Hide asked, promising himself that whatever it was that he would be aware of if he was doing it himself. He knew he may have only one shot at being close to such a damaged soul and he didn’t want to ruin it over something he could easily control.

“Being his usual flamboyant self. Shuu is good at charming people but he can be pretty dense and insensitive when it comes to their feelings. He pushed Kaneki into opening up to people and showing more romantic gestures so hard that he snapped.”

“I don’t know anything about books…I know about manga though,” Hide mentioned hopefully.

“Then you better start reading! Grow a fucking brain between those ears. Based on information from Shuu, he likes horror books the most, especially poetry.”

 

“Why are you even telling me this?”

Nishiki looked over at Hide again, hesitating a moment before deciding to say, “When I walked past his room on the way to breakfast this morning, he was talking about some blonde kid to the nurse. Figured it was you. You must be something of interest to him because Kaneki barely speaks as it is.”

“Wow Nishiki, I didn’t know you had a heart. It could be any blonde kid though,” Hide joked, though he felt his heart pick up speed at the thought of Kaneki talking about him. He also felt nervous at the thought of seeing him again at lunch. He hadn’t felt such intense feelings for someone before and it freaked him out, especially since he felt such a strange pull to Kaneki. He hated not feeling in control and he wondered if it would be a good idea to even be involved with someone so broken like that.

“Shut it Shittychika. Besides you’re the only blonde kid I’m aware of on this unit. I’m just tired of his screaming and carrying on. Kid needs something good in his life and you seem like the type of annoying idiot to do it.”

Hide rolled his eyes but left Nishiki alone in favor of laying his head back down to replay the possible scenarios that could go down in his head. What if he said something wrong on accident and sent Kaneki into a mental breakdown? What if Kaneki broke down and Hide made it worse? He didn’t want to cause the other more pain…just replaying that scene when his gray eyes locked on his as his face was pushed into the ground was enough for tears to spring back into his eyes. How…how could someone he hadn’t even met before produce such intense emotions within him when he thought they were locked away forever so many years ago? Please…for the love of god please don’t let this end like Akane all over again, the blonde thought to himself.

~

“Dude stop acting like you’re about to ask him out. You’re going to freak him out by acting freaked out yourself,” Nishiki complained, noticing how fidgety Hide was as they waited for staff to escort them down to the food court. Hide whipped his head around to send a glare at Nishiki. With these strange emotions coursing through him, it damn near felt like he was asking him out. Besides, it wasn’t like he was ruling out the possibility he might’ve fallen in love with the white haired beauty. He did see the truth in Nishiki’s words though, it would only increase Kaneki’s anxiety if he was anxious himself.

The blonde forced himself to take a few deep breaths as they finally made the trek to the food court, ignoring the fact he still had no idea how he was going to approach Kaneki or when would be the right time, but he didn’t have to wonder any longer because when they stepped foot in the food court another code was taking place by yours truly.

Kaneki was clutching his head screaming at the top his lungs numbers counting down from sevens from 1000. He sat on the ground, pressed into the corner of the room near where he sat before the day Hide first saw him. His head was wrenched away as if he was trying to turn himself away from someone or something in front of him that wished to hurt him. The staff that had led them down slowly approached the scene, preparing to give back up to the staff members that were slowly surrounding him, the buff dudes from before hung in the back at ready to restrain and sedate him. Hide felt a moment’s hesitation to place himself into the situation, but when he saw one of those big dudes take another step towards him he was reminded of their harsh treatment to him before and that reminded him of his promise. He wasn’t going to let this happen to Kaneki again. He was going to show them that there were other ways to calming someone than to sedate them!

Hide managed to slip out of his group and run towards the scene, hearing the staff shout at him to stay back while a few other staff tried to reach out and grab him but he was too quick for them. It was until he was a few feet away from Kaneki, that he let his instincts take over as he got on his hands and knees, making sure Kaneki could see his entire body. Kaneki had jolted when the blonde fell on all fours in front of him, still counting down. Hide didn’t move any farther to Kaneki, instead showing both his hands in surrender to let him know he wasn’t going to harm him as he began to count down with him, going the same erratic pace Kaneki was going.

“846, 839, 832, 825, 818, 811,804, 797,790,783,776…” Hide counted along with him, thankful that his math skills made it easy for him to keep pace with Kaneki who continued at such a fast pace that Hide thought he could put math geeks to shame. As he continued to count with Kaneki, he raised his voice a little so the other could hear it and began to slow his own counting. He almost smiled when he found the whitette was beginning to follow his pace and slow down as well. He wasn’t going to celebrate quite yet though because there were still so many numbers and he was still so far away from him.

“552, 545, 538, 531, 524,” Hide continued, dropping his volume and pace little by little all while shifting inch by inch towards Kaneki. He wasn’t aware of the audience they had or how tired his mind felt subtracting, his full focus was on Kaneki, whose hands lessened their grip on his hair and he seemed more aware that there was someone else there.

“454..447..440..433..426..” Hide took off his jacket, continuing to slowly push himself forward until Kaneki’s shrunk up more against the wall. He then stopped where he was but continued to count with him.

“377…370…363…356…” Hide tried again to move forward, this time Kaneki didn’t shrink back but locked his fearful, confused eyes on the warm amber ones that peered at him, silently questioning if he could still come forward.

“293…286…279…272…” Hide was almost close enough now where if he reached out he could touch the other’s shoulder, but he continued to move closer. He hesitantly raised his hand up, starting with Kaneki’s hands which were as cold as ice. As he continued to slow his counting pace and lowering his voice he slowly inched his hands up over his forearms.

“202…195…188…181…” Hide’s hands were now on Kaneki’s upper arms. The whitette looked into Hide’s eyes shyly, his body tensing up when the other put his hands on him, but his tension melted away into the blonde’s warmth. Hide’s hands continued to move forward until they rested on the other’s shoulders where they stayed planted, awaiting Kaneki to initiate whether or not they moved closer.

“125…118…111…104…97…” Hide stayed where he was, even though his heart was pounding in his chest and it was becoming harder to keep his voice from shaking, even though they were almost whispering now. God, f he was beautiful from far away then he was absolutely stunning face to face like this, even with the tear tracks down his face, the red-rimmed eyes, or the fact that his nose was dripping to. He could the flecks of dark gray in the sea of lighter gray that moved over his face, looking for hints of malice or trickery. He wanted so badly to come closer, but he wanted Kaneki to be the one to choose whether or not they did.

“83…76…69…62…55” It felt like an eternity before Kaneki finally moved closer to rest his head on Hide’s shoulder in a silent request for a hug.

“48….41….34….27….20….” Hide moved his hands down the other’s back slowly, before lightly embracing him, giving a chance to escape if he needed to. He felt a shaky sigh escape the other’s mouth before he felt his body go limp in his arms, all tension leaving.

“13…6…0” Hide finished, deciding to say fuck it to the fact that six minus seven did not equal zero, some rules needed to be broken. The blonde let his head slowly drop down to the whitette’s shoulder, keeping his weight light above the other so he wouldn’t smother him. He couldn’t believe it. He was actually hugging him. He didn’t expect to get this far at all and even though his body was cold Hide felt the cold numbness inside him melt away with the other’s body pressed so close to his. He didn’t realize just how badly his body was yearning for something like this until now, to feel human contact, to feel someone else’s heartbeat against his own, to connect so deeply with someone. It’s been so long. He felt his bottom lip begin to quiver, but he bit it, determined to stay strong.

It felt like eternity when he felt the other’s head finally remove itself from his shoulder to look at him, he kept his body pressed to him though, which Hide was thankful for. Soft gray orbs looked around, feeling self-conscious at the staff that had gathered around them. Some staff stood in confusion, others in awe, and a few in disapproval at the amount of contact the two patients had. The gray eyes finally landed on Hide and the whitette tilted his head a little bit before his soft crackly voice came to life in a question.

“What’s your name? “Hide continued to stare dreamily into Kaneki’s eyes, blinking in surprise when he heard his voice

“What?”

“Your name?” Kaneki asked again with a soft, patient smile.

“Oh. It’s Hideyoshi Nagachika. People call me Hide,” the blonde responded.

“What’s yours?”

“Don’t you already know mine?” Kaneki asked, his eyebrows pinching together in confusion.

“I do. But I want to hear it from you.”

Hide saw a light blush spread across Kaneki’s cheeks as he responded,” Kaneki Ken. Everyone calls me Kaneki.”

Hide hummed as he moved one of his hands to lay on top of Kaneki’s colder one, his eyebrows knitted in concern

“Are you usually this cold?”

“Yeah…” Kaneki responded, his blush darkening as the other held his hand, “Are you usually this warm?”

“No. I mean…well I wear a jacket a lot…you make me feel really warm right now,” the blonde responded, lightly blushing at what he just admitted. Hide’s eyes widened when he heard a choked sound coming from Kaneki, when the other raised a hand to his mouth he realized the other was actually laughing. He looks cute when he’s laughing, the blonde thought to himself, the staff were finally dispersing and the patients were moving on to get their food like nothing happened.

Kaneki looked around noticing this with a guilty expression, and he seemed like he was shrinking down into himself, “Ah…well…thank you Hide. I’m sorry. I wasted your time and you don’t have a lot of time left to eat.”

“Don’t be sorry! I can eat pretty quickly b-but uhm…” the blonde trailed off as he scratched the side of his face nervously, “I haven’t really made any friends yet…can I eat with you?”

Kaneki’s eyes widened at the request but a grin slowly spread across his face and his gray eyes lit up in childish delight, “Yeah. That sounds nice…i-if you want to that is.”

Hide felt his insides light up and his skin vibrate with energy he didn’t know he still had as he stood up and offered a hand down to Kaneki, “Of course I want to!”

“Oh, your jacket!” Kaneki responded, grabbing the jacket Hide had left on the floor before accepting his hand up.

“Oh! Hey you want to wear it to warm up? It’s seriously really comfy,” the blonde offered as he took the jacket in his hand.

“Uh…well…you don’t have to-“

“Nonsense, let me help you,” the blonde responded like a man on a mission (which was technically true because he couldn’t wait to see how adorable the other would look wearing his jacket) as he helped Kaneki thread his arms through the arms of the jacket. The other looked up at him a questioning look displayed on his face, as if he was asking him if this was okay. His blush had darkened but it would’ve been a lie to say he didn’t look comfortable.

Hide gave him a blinding smile in response and a thumbs up, “Alright! I’ll be right back okay?”

Kaneki nodded, watching the blonde walk away before burying his nose into the jacket and breathing in the scent. It smelled like summer…


	3. Ch 3.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING THIS DOES HAVE A RAPE SCENE, SUICIDE ATTEMPT AND SUICIDE IN THIS CHAPTER! Read at your own risk!

It was sophomore year in high school when his depression really started to drag him down and for the sake of feeling something Hide started to partake in riskier behavior. He loved going out into the outskirts of town and staying around the rail road tracks. When he heard a train approaching, he’d stand in the middle of the tracks. The rumbling of the ground under his feet, his racing heart beat gave him such a thrill that it was in those moments he truly believed that was how ordinary people must’ve felt to be alive. A feeling he was only able to feel risking his own life. He’d wait until the last second to jump away from the train and as he turned around to watch it speed past that adrenaline rush would leave him alone as well, leaving him alone with his thoughts and the numbness.

When he didn’t go to the railroad tracks, he hung around the druggies from class in search of more risky situations. With them he tried alcohol for the first time and while he wasn’t fond of it, he drank because he loved it when it burned going down and lit up his insides. It was rare he got shit-faced but his parents still nagged at him for reeking of alcohol at the end of the night so he always ended up being grounded. He also learned about what it was like to go to clubs which was a thrill itself for Hide since he was a diehard music fan. He loved the feeling of the bass going through his body and the way those colorful lights would swirl around and around the mass of people grinding up against each other. Being smashed up against other sweaty bodies was not Hide’s things, but he always loved to watch those colors dance on the floor and up the walls to the music. As for other drugs, Hide was just scared of losing his control over his body, which is also why he wasn’t fond of getting shit-faced like his friends.

When he was grounded Hide still found ways to get his adrenaline rush. He found it through a blade, through drinking alcohol he smuggled into his room ( which was very seldom), and sometimes if he was particularly bored he’d hold his breath as long as he possibly could. If he had to name something that he did for a high that wasn’t self-harming it would have to be listening to music but even then there were limitations as to what music could do.

So what made him start to feel such numbing depression? If you had asked his parents they’d probably say he was born with it and spin up some sad story over how they had desperately tried to be there for their son. If you’d ask his brother, he’d take his parent’s side. If you’d ask Hide…Hide would tell you it had started when he was five years old and slowly got progressively worse through his parents’ lack of ability to see what they were doing to their youngest son.

When he was five his family was at the subway train station and they were going to go to the beach since it had been a particularly warm summer day out. For Hide, his main concerns in life was to have fun and to not have a care in the world. He was currently talking his mother’s ear off about all the fun they were going to have at the beach that day when he was distracted by the sound of the train they were going to ride approaching. Nobody could’ve predicted that a man was going to dart ahead of them and jump down to the tracks just in time for the train to run right into his body with a sickening thump. Whenever he looked back at this memory he couldn’t help but pay particular attention of the way the blood splattered up against the walls, it looked like an artist just took a bucket of red paint, said fuck it, and just threw the whole paint can against the wall of the train station. At this age Hide didn’t have a particular grasp of the finality of death, but he knew that seeing that much blood coming from a person meant something bad. As the metallic smell of blood filled up the room a high-pitched sound rung in his ears and it was after he was picked up and carried away by his father that the sound was his own screaming, his raw throat proof of it.

His parents thought he would just forget that it ever happened, but after countless nightmares and bed wetting they found that it wouldn’t be the case. It would be at this point you would be questioning why they didn’t just send him to a therapist and the answer was simple, they didn’t because they were too prideful. Their family was highly regarded, his father was a doctor and his mother a lawyer and god forbid someone found out their youngest child needed therapy. This later set the stage for the shaky foundations Hide had with is parents, and later on his brother. In order to deal with his bed wetting there were many times Hide was scolded by his parents and sometimes beaten by his father, especially if he had a rough night at the hospital and little sleep. Later on Hide began to fall through the cracks a bit in the grade department, at least in his parents’ eyes who only expected the best of grades which was straight A’s. The teachers saw Hide as an extremely smart kid who was friendly and always lit up any room he walked in, but his parents decided this just wasn’t the case and forced him to study harder. This meant no hanging out with friends and having his parents belittle him and compare him to his older brother who was an A student, star track athlete and the heart throb of every girl at school.

When he hit middle school the world became gray, routine and thoroughly boring for him. Everyone around him had friend groups, they were starting to date, and his brother was getting ready to graduate high school. Hide was left in the gray area, he didn’t fit anywhere. He didn’t love anyone except for the male music artists he adored but god forbid he asked his parents what this meant. He had many acquaintances, but they didn’t want anything to do with him unless they could use him for something. It didn’t matter how badly he fought for their attention, he just wasn’t good enough. That didn’t stop him from trying though. It was when his brother graduated that he realized just how little he mattered in his parent’s lives so he started to rebel. He started out with little things, like skipping school, staying out past curfew, all for the sake of getting attention from his parents. He then found that he was an adrenaline junkie and those behaviors became riskier.

Now in sophomore year, things stayed constant. His parents bitched at him almost on a daily basis for one thing or another. However, things changed on that first day of school when Akane Nakano waltzed her way into Hide’s life and fucked things up a little more for him. When she walked through she carried the aura that screamed “I may look weak, but try me and I’ll have you groveling at my knees for forgiveness”. She had long, dyed, blood red hair, black roots showing through at the top of her head. Her eyes were green like a cat’s which made her seem like she was staring right into your soul every time she looked at you. She had little rabbits doodled all over her backpack, on her sneakers, even a little rabbit pin in her hair, but this didn’t make her any less threatening.

“Class, I want you to give a warm welcome to our new student joining us today. Her name is Akane Nakano and I expect you all to make her feel at home,” the teacher responded sternly, his eyes scanning the classroom for an open desk. Had it been that they were stuck in some cheesy romance novel there would be an open desk next to Hide and the new student would sit right next to him, but at this point in his life everything was gray and boring so of course Akane was stuck in the far corner of the room. That didn’t stop her from looking over at him during the rest of class in interest. Later when Hide would ask her why she found him so interesting as they lay on her bed, splitting a bottle of Jim Beam, she’d say that he didn’t seem like he belonged there in the midst of their classmates. He was a black rabbit in disguise amongst the white softness of their peers.

In a few days time Akane made her rebellious reputation known and was successfully integrated into the group of bad kids. During those few days Hide stayed at home, behaving himself, but he began to feel that familiar low and after some pressuring on their end, he joined a group of boys who decided to hit the streets in search of a good time.

“Oi look who decided to show up today!”

“Nagachika, it’s about damn time. We thought you forgot about us!”

“Yeah after that night Ryuji nearly died of alcohol poisoning I didn’t think you’d be back!”

Off in the corner of the alleyway they decided to meet up in he spotted Akane leaning up against the brick wall looking bored with their conversation. When she saw he had stumbled onto the scene a small smile danced on her lips as she pushed herself off the wall to stride over to him.

“Oh yeah you two haven’t met yet,” the leader, a tall, buff senior named Gakuto said, “Her name is Akane Nakano.”

“Don’t let her short stature fool you, she beat Gakuto in an arm wrestling contest,” a junior piped up from the back.

“Man I said not to talk about that!” Gakuto turned on the junior with a glare who cackled in response.

Akane rolled her eyes at the two bickering before she reached over to caress Hide’s hair which at this point of time was a short dark brown color.

“Nagachika huh…? Ever thought of going blonde?”

“Blonde?”

“Yeah, I think you’d look good and you seem to be a fan of yellow,” Akane said, nodding her head towards his black and yellow jacket, “I think it’ll fit your personality. I can do it for you if ya want.”

Hide blinked in surprise. He wasn’t used to people touching him like this when they only just met, especially a girl but managed to choke out, “Uh…sure…just let me think it over.”

“Alright. So ya got a first name Nagachika?”

“Hideyoshi. People just call me Hide.”

“Alright Hide.”

They spent the night by each other’s side while following the rest of the group into Gakuto’s car where they drove around a bit until they came up to a convenience store. Gakuto and another group member went into the convenience store to get some alcohol for everyone else. Akane passed on the alcohol, to which Hide followed suit because he found something a lot more interesting that was an adrenaline rush itself. Akane.

As the night progressed the group members had gotten significantly drunker and more putrid, deciding it would be a great idea to hit up one of the local clubs. The two of them stayed near the back of the club, deciding to exchange their life stories as they watch their friends make utter fools of themselves.

“So where did you move from Akane?”

“Osaka prefecture. Mom finally had enough of Dad being a total prick drinking up our money and yelling and throwing his fists at us,” Akane responded, “What brings you to the night life?”

“Boredom. My dad is a doctor and mom a lawyer. My older brother has plans to go to med school and they’ve decided I’m a lost cause after years of pushing me to be like my brother or how they were as kids,” the blonde responded.

“Oh so they’re those types of parents…sucky. I can understand why. Well Hide, this club is sufficiently boring me out of my skull and there is only so much more stupidity I can take. Do you know of any interesting places?” she asked.

“Interesting? No. But I have a few places I like to go to when I want to be alone.”

“Good enough. Let’s go.”

So they went to the railroad tracks where they could hear the calm quiet of the cool night without the interruptions of cars or loud drunks. Hide kicked around a pebble as the two of them walked along the railroad tracks, talking about life, about dreams, about music.

“So, why do you like coming here Hide? Is there some sophisticated, deep thinker kind of reason?” Akane asked.

“Not really. I like to stand in the middle of the tracks, wait for a train to come along, and jump away at the last second. Adrenaline rush,” Hide explained.

“Oh, so you’re not suicidal,” was her response.

Hide simply shrugged his shoulders, not able to give a definitive answer. He didn’t exactly want to die, but if he did happen to die he didn’t really mind although it would suck not being able to listen to music anymore. He never actually thought about suicide before or questioned whether his actions spelled out that he was nearing that edge until she mentioned it. They quickly changed topics and stayed around the railroads until the wee hours of morning, just barely hitting the time his parents would be up so he still had a good chance of sneaking back in the house without them knowing he hoped. Before they split off in separate directions, back to their own sad realities, they exchanged numbers and spent until the late morning texting each other.

After that night, the two of them were texting every day, the topics ranging from surface level stuff like how shitty the reading assignment in history was to what they thought it would be like to die. School life wasn’t particularly nice for Akane, she was bullied for her hair and stand-offish attitude, but she took all in grace as long as she had Hide and their group of delinquents. As days passed, Akane initiated more deeper topics and since Hide was just glad for a little light in his life, he didn’t question it. Sure, the topics made him feel over all more depressed, but he felt that by being open, maybe it would make him feel better in the long run. After a few weeks Hide took up her offer and let her dye his hair blonde which, guessing from his mother bursting into tears and his father screaming at him that he was going to give people the wrong idea about who he was, his parents were not thrilled whatsoever. In response Hide screamed back that anyone who judged people’s personalities based on what they looked like was the reason why the world was going to hell in a hand basket. Hide felt like it was something he needed for a long time, like it was the start of seeing life become more colorful and it was all thanks to Akane.

When they were hanging out they stayed further away from the group, talked more, started to drink a little more. Hide began to notice Akane got darker when she drank. She liked to talk about days where she walked to school with bruises on her arms and everyone pretending not to notice. She loved talking about which brands of alcohol brought out which reactions from her dad. Beer was verbal abuse. Wine, he was pretty okay, but he seldom drank it. Liquor, which he drank a lot, produced verbal and physical. Hide noticed a similar pattern depending on what she drank.

Beer made her like to talk about death, abuse, her father, and self-harm. Whiskey had the same effect, though she also became more physical which Hide found out that night they shared a bottle of Jim Beam in her room one night.

“So…like what made you want to hang out with me in the first place?” the blonde asked, the alcohol helping him to loosen up. He was laying on his side, staring into those piercing green eyes that were glazed over from drink.

“Cuz you’re different,” Akane said, her words slurring together. She had drunk a lot more than Hide had at the moment.

“Uhh…okay a lot of people are different. What makes my different so…”

“Interesting?”

“Sure.”

Akane hummed, pressing an index finger to her mouth in thought and narrowing her eyes at Hide. After a few moments she spoke, “Well I guess it’s because you look like everyone else from the outside, but if someone looked a bit closer they’d see behind that ruse. You’re a black rabbit in disguise among a bunch of white rabbits.”

“Oh…” the blonde responded with a small blush, a little disappointed that he was compared to something dark rather than something colorful or happy but feeling like she hit the nail on the head. He did feel like sometimes he was just putting on an act for people, but he didn’t realize Akane could easily see through that façade, “Is that a bad thing?”

“No, I don’t think so. It makes you stick out, but not enough for someone without a trained eye. It makes you special. Besides I think black rabbits are sexier,” she said with a smile that showed off her white, slightly crooked teeth.

“Oh…” he responded, feeling his face flush a bit darker which made Akane laugh. She reached up a hand to caress his hair which had become sort of a habit for her, apparently. She loved how soft and fluffy his hair was and lovingly referred to it as soft as rabbit’s fur. The blonde involuntarily leaned closer, not realizing how touch starved he was until he was alone in bed missing the calming feeling of her hands running through his hair. He hadn’t realized he had his eyes closed until they snapped open at the feeling of lips being pressed against his forehead.

Hide looked up, a question on his lips but was interrupted when her lips met his own, his eyes widening in shock. She laughed when she pulled away and saw his shocked expression.

“What? Never been kissed by a girl before?”

“Does my mom count?” Hide asked, trying to keep everything light but feeling a little put off by how direct she was being.

She laughed again, taking that as a sign he was comfortable, which he wasn’t. Granted Akane gave him a new meaning in his life and made everything a bit more…bearable…but he wasn’t sure that he felt that way about her. He felt a hand mess with the bottom of his shirt before going underneath to caress the skin that lay hidden underneath there and he felt his body jolt and his heart pick up speed.

“Ticklish?” she laughed.

Hide swallowed hard, wracking his mind for a way to tell Akane that he didn’t want this without hurting her or making her angry, “Maybe…look I-I…I don’t think we should do this…”

“It’s okay, just relax. I know what I’m doing,” she slurred.

No you don’t know what you’re doing, Hide wanted to say. You’re drunk right now, I didn’t come prepared, I’m not sure if I even like girls, he wanted to shout but he feared of losing this only thing that he had. She had moved so that she was on top of him and it was with fear running down his spine that Hide realized just how strong she was and how hard it would be to move her off of him. Maybe he was just being a baby, I mean it was just his virginity, right? This could be the only time he would have sex with anyone, but he wanted it to be special and something the other person could remember. If he was to experience it only once in his life, he wanted it to at least mean something!

“Akane…I’m not comfortable-“

“Oh I’ll make you feel comfortable my dear little bunny,” she whispered as she began to grind down against Hide which made a moan rise to his lips but he bit down on them to keep it from escaping his mouth.

“No Akane, I mean I don’t want this! Please st-stop,” Hide choked out, his fear rising as he felt his body betray him.

“Really? Your body says differently. You don’t have to be afraid, I’ll take good care of you,” she said, her fingers trailing down to unbutton his pants.

“No that’s not what I mean! Akane st-” Hide tried to shout but it was cut off by a moan when he felt her begin to palm him through his underwear. Dammit! No! He whimpered, feeling tears of frustration spring to his eyes.

“Don’t cry. Soon I promise.”

“Stop! Akane listen to me-“ he shouted.

“Don’t boss me around, you’re not my father!” she snapped, her green eyes flashed predatorily, reaching her hands up to pin his hands up above his head. Hide tried to squirm out of her grasp, but that junior wasn’t kidding when he said she won against Gakuto in an arm wrestling match. He felt his body freeze when he felt her hand squeeze around him in warning to stay still.

She waited a few moments like that, reeling in her anger before responding, “Hide…I love you so much. I’ve been waiting so long to do this…I know it’s scary now but it’ll get better. I promise.”

Hide bit his lip harder, letting his head hit back against the pillow as he felt tears freely roll down his cheeks. What could he do to make her stop? His body was working against his will and no matter how hard he tried, couldn’t move a muscle. He didn’t want to hit her or hurt her in any other way. He couldn’t think straight with the way her fingers were pumping him like that. He wished it didn’t feel this good. It shouldn’t feel this good, not when his friend was drunk like this.

“Look at me Hide.”

No. No he didn’t want to see her face, he didn’t want this side of her to be burned into his memory.

“Look at me!” she commanded, as she grabbed a fistful of his hair and violently twisted his head to look at her. Hide narrowed his eyes, wanting to try and block out the sight of her face as much as possible. Her eyes staring at him like he was her prey, not at all like those friendly, happy ones that he came to care and love. She leaned down to press a kiss against Hide’s lips, her hand a bruising grip on his wrists as she began to unbutton and unzip her own pants, bringing them down along with her underwear and clumsily kicking them away. The taste of alcohol on her lips made his stomach turn as she pulled away to mess with his pants to bring them down lower.

Hide inhaled sharply as he felt his erection hit the cold air of the room, he gritted his teeth both because his wrists were beginning to hurt and because of his own anger at himself. Why didn’t he just hit her? Push her off somehow!? She didn’t have any right doing this to him! Later on as he thought about his inability to do anything, he assumed it was because he didn’t want to be like her father. Another reason would be that it could come back and bite him in the long run. He’d be seen as the abuser and she could spin it back on him to make it seem like he was the one who raped her. So, he just gritted his teeth, wanting it to be over as soon as possible and hoping that maybe she won’t remember this.

“Look Hide. Look how ready I am for you. You’ve barely done anything and yet you have this effect on me,” she cooed, wiping away his tears before she sunk herself down on him a loud whimper ripped itself out of Hide’s throat as he felt her tight walls clench around him. Hide closed his eyes as she began to move, his whimpering growing louder as he felt his stomach begin to coil up.

“A-Akane…I-I’m sorry,” Hide choked out, not understanding quite why he decided to say that of all things at that time, but it felt like something he should say. Whether it was for her shitty upbringing, for what she was doing to him right now, whether it was for his inability to stop her, or what happened afterwards with him barely able to meet her gaze.

“Shhh…it’s okay” she panted. She moaned loudly and her walls convulsed around Hide which finally sent him over the edge with a loud sob. Hide let her ride out her high and collapse on top of him, the iron grip on his wrists finally relaxing. He watched her breathing even out as she fell into a deep sleep, leaving him alone in his own numbing mind. It was awhile until he had the guts to move her off of him, but when he did he walked over to her bathroom to grab a wet wash cloth and returned to clean her off. Why? Why the hell should he care after all this? Maybe it was out of some sick form of love. Even after the pain she caused him. He still loved her enough to make sure she was clean and had a blanket over her.

The blonde stared at her sleeping form for a minute or two before he took the bottle of alcohol on the floor, swigging back the remaining contents, and took that rabbit clip she wore in her hair when he first saw her before walking out of her room, out of her life, not knowing this would be the last time he’d have talked to her before she sent herself off the school’s roof top in guilt from this night.

After that night Hide didn’t leave his house anymore, other than to go to school. He wouldn’t go anywhere else until a day after her death, desperate for some kind of release. He threw himself into his studies and when he had nothing to do he laid in his bed with his headphones on in an attempt to make him feel something other than the numbness.

It was two weeks later when Hide was sitting in the classroom, waiting for class to start. Two weeks of ignoring Akane’s texts, avoiding her in the halls, avoiding her gaze, when someone slammed open the door to say, “Guys! New kid is on the roof! She’s gonna jump!”

Hide rejected her and since he was no longer around, it was harder to deal with the jeers, to deal with her past, to deal with life in general. He remembers rushing outside along side a sea of bodies outside to watch the show. Friends were talking with each other.

“Is she really gonna do it?”

“Maybe, she seems crazy enough to.”

“Hey it’s that kid, Nagachika, didn’t he used to hang out with her?”

There were teachers and a few people from their group, urging her not to jump, to think about what she was doing, but Hide knew by the blank look on her face that there was no getting through to her. Hide tripped and landed on his hands and knees, looking up to see her green eyes connect with his for one moment, and then watching as her figure began its graceful descent down, making no noise until she hit the pavement with a dull, sickening thud. It was deathly quiet during those few seconds but it felt like it stretched on for eternity. Then came the screams, the crying, the sirens, but Hide felt stuck there on the ground, staring at the blood pooling around her lifeless body, her left leg was twisted at an odd angle. He couldn’t move no matter how hard he tried. I’m sorry, Akane. I couldn’t give you what you wanted. What you needed. I couldn’t help you at all. I was weak. I could’ve done better. I could’ve been better.

Everything else was a blur. A teacher might’ve come to collect him, a police officer, or maybe one of his so-called friends. All he knew was that he was there sitting on the grass, watching her body being placed in a body bag, being taken away and then he was at home sitting on one of the chairs in the living room. A police officer sat across from him, asking him questions, but he couldn’t find it in himself to speak so his mother and father filled in the blanks. Trying to make up some bullshit story to make their youngest son seem innocent, their faces tense, fearful of their reputation being ruined because of the incident.

When the police officer left, his parents turned on him demanding to know his relation to the Akane girl, if he was the reason why she killed herself, if she was the reason why his hair was dyed and he was always out all night. The guilt couldn’t be held down any longer and with a fist to his mouth, the bile rising, Hide bolted to the bathroom where he stayed for the rest of the night his body tearing itself from the inside out. When his body was spent he laid, against the cold floor where his mind followed suit beginning to tear itself apart. He was torn from sleep, his body shaking violently in panic, his lungs straining with the amount of oxygen Hide was forcing inside them. Then he’d pass out again, waiting for the next wave of panic.

By morning, Hide woke up feeling sticky, and like there were sand bags tied to his limbs. His throat burned, his chest hurt and he smelled like sweat and vomit. He slowly peeled himself off the floor. Took a shower. Cleaned up his mess. Went to his room with a towel wrapped around his waist. His parents were at work. He put on clean clothes. He laid down on his bed and slept without dreaming, without panic attacks until night. He laid there for a while longer after waking up. Then he felt like he was jumping out of his skin. He went out and walked to the railroad. Finding nothing he walked to the club the group usually hung out at. He got bored and walked to the school. He walked to cemetery. He just walked like a robot without any purpose. He threw himself into his studies. He shut out the world. He stopped hanging out with his group of friends. He stayed home leaving only for school, to go to the railroad and play with the trains but Hide found even that adrenaline rush was gone. He tried alcohol. Nothing. Tearing a blade through his thigh. Nothing. He began to step over that edge.

Hide moved out. Went to college. Did whatever normal college students did which included drinking almost unhealthy amounts of caffeine, forgetting to eat at times, and being sleep deprived. Hide got sleeping pills to help him rest at night. Music was a temporary band aid, a temporary release from the world that once brought him so much relief. Hide began to hear the music dull and the world turn black. It wasn’t worth it anymore. Hide grabbed his sleeping pills, poured as many pills as he could into his hand, flung him in his mouth, swallowed them down and waited for eternal sleep. He dropped the empty pill container to the ground and slowly let himself slide down to the floor. He heard dull banging noises. He didn’t care. His eyelids felt heavy, his breathing was slowing, his heart beat beating slower. Rin, his peer that had come over to work on their biology project, opened the door. Rin walked into his apartment and opened the bathroom door. Hide remembered seeing his face of shock as he stumbled upon the scene and watched him take out his cell phone to call the paramedics. Then Blackness.


	4. Chapter 4

“What do you mean you’ve never read Shakespeare!?” Kaneki exclaimed, his gray eyes wide in disbelief, the two of them were seated in the far corner of the small dining/hang out area they had on their unit. When they came back from lunch the staff members went to the back towards the nurses’ station whispering excitedly to each other with the old man that tried to convince him his first day here to stay out and watch a movie with everyone else. The old man, who he later learned was named Yoshimura, was very pleased that their long-term patient had connected with their newest admit. Most times Kaneki stayed in his room, only leaving to go to the bathroom or to go eat, always accompanied by a staff member. Hide didn’t mind because he only had eyes for Kaneki who seemed thrilled at this change of scenery.

“I’m serious. I haven’t read any of his works,” Hide chuckled at the other’s reaction, his hands raised his surrender.

“How!? Isn’t it a requirement for all high schoolers to have read at least one of his plays before they graduate? Please tell me you at least know the plot line of Romeo and Juliet.”

“Guess they must’ve figured we were all lost causes anyway and just sent us on our merry ways without a second thought. No worries though, I am very well aware of the plot lines of Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, and Macbeth.”

“But never read them?”

“No?”

“Kafka?”

“No.”

“Nathanial Hawthorne? Charles Dickens? Homer? Edgar Allen Poe. Stephen King? Sen Takatsuki?”

“Nope.”

“You’ve never read Beowulf, Frakenstein, Dracula, The Metamorphosis, The Picture of Dorian Gray, Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Hyde? The Black Goats Egg?” Kaneki asked, his voice going higher in pitch in his disbelief.

“Nada, although the Jekyll and Hyde sounds interesting, sounds like someone is mispronouncing my name in that,” Hide said, finding joy at how animated Kaneki was even though they’d only been talking to each other for about two hours.

“Do you even read!?” he asked in frustration.

“Not really…does manga count?” Hide said, scratching his cheek sheepishly.

Kaneki frowned at Hide, sat back in his seat and crossed his arms as he stared at Hide with a mixture of disgust and pity, “No, not really. You were doing so well too. What a disappointment.”

“Wait, what does that mean? You don’t want to hang out anymore? Dude give me a second chance, I’ll change! Show me the error of my ways Kaneki,” Hide responded dramatically, hoping that he wasn’t being serious.

Kaneki frowned further as he watched Hide’s dramatic display, his lips pursed in a way that made Hide think he was utterly adorable even when he was trying to be mad. Hide felt his heart sink when he looked back up at Kaneki and realized that maybe he was actually disgusted with him.

Kaneki tilted his head to the side, his gray eyes narrowing, staring skeptically at Hide before his face softened into a soft, playful smile.

“Alright, I take pity on you, you poor uncultured creature,” he laughed softly before he held out his hand, “Follow me.”

Hide flashed Kaneki another grin, feeling excitement bubble up inside him as he took his hand and let himself be pulled to the other’s room. Even though he didn’t care much about books he found himself excited to learn more about Kaneki. He wanted to keep seeing his eyes light up like they did when he talks about books, even ones with such dark themes, because it made him look young and it brought out his beauty even more. He allowed himself to enjoy the soft hand that held his and the way he felt Kaneki’s cold thumb rub against the warmer skin of his hand. As much as he began to hate himself for it, he allowed himself to sink deeper into this happy thing that came his way, hoping to god that maybe this thing wouldn’t be taken away from him in the end. It couldn’t be worse, right? He already tried to kill himself.

“Okay,” Kaneki responded as they walked into his room, he led Hide over to his bed and pushed him down gently so he was sitting there patiently while he walked to his pile of books in the corner of his room. He crouched down, a finger pressed to his lips as his eyes scanned his collection of books with serious consideration. His eyes lit up and a smile danced across his lips a moment later one he found the book he was looking for, “Okay let’s start with this one. I’m not going to bore you to tears with the classical stuff yet. We’ll try young adult fiction first.”

Kaneki walked over to Hide, seating himself behind him as he handed over the book that had a light blue background and was decorated with sticky notes on the cover. All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven. Hide hummed, lightly running his fingers over the smooth cover before flipping it over to read the back. Shit, he thought to himself. It seemed like a romance novel that might not have a happy ending, and wondered if he was going to cry. He flipped through the pages gently, not wanting to mar this little treasure of his, allowing the smell of the pages to hit his nose. 388 pages.

Hide looked over at the other who had curled up in a ball, near his pillow, watching his every movement with a small smile, his eyes lit up excitedly that seemed to say, ‘Well what do you think?’

“I don’t know Kaneki…you think I can handle it? You’re not gonna judge me if I end up bawling my eyes out, right? I got a soft spot for cheesy romance,” Hide laughed, raising his eyebrow challengingly.

“Yeah, it shows and I think you are fully capable of reading that. You graduated high school-“

“A very dense and uncultured one”

“You still graduated which means you have the ability to read somewhat. I have faith,” Kaneki smiled.

“Okay, I’ll get started on it tonight-“

“Stay. Read it right now, there’s plenty of room on the bed,” Kaneki said, his eyes flashing with anticipation as he slowly unraveled from his ball. His eyes dimmed immediately though self-consciously, and he grew smaller, “That is…if you want to. I don’t want to keep you if you have other things to do…”

“Nah, it’s totally fine, I’d love to!” the blonde said, showing his own excitement. Any excuse to stay near him.

Kaneki searched his face skeptically, searching for a lie, but after seeing his enthusiasm was real, his eyes lit up like a firecracker and a huge grin took over his face. “Okay!”  
Adorable. Hide felt his heart melt and form a puddle at his feet and he was overcome with the urge to hug him. His excitement was addicting!

“Okay…uhm soo…” Hide responded, not sure where he should sit exactly or what Kaneki was going to do while he read the book.

“Uhm…” Kaneki responded, a small blush forming on his face as he noticed the predicament, he began to look away, “Uhm…this might sound weird…but…”  
Hide blinked owlishly at him, wondering what he was thinking about that would make him feel suddenly embarrassed. The blonde waited patiently, nodding encouragingly for him to continue.

“Well uh…w-would it be okay if maybe…you held me and read the book to me. Y-You’re warm and your voice is very calming…” Kaneki asked, his voice wavering with nerves as he seemed to shrink back down into himself, “Y-You don’t have to. I mean…”

Hide blinked in pleasant surprise his heart picking up speed in excitement as a huge grin stretched across his face. He didn’t want to admit it, but it’s been a very long time since he had physical contact with someone. After his breakdown earlier, he didn’t blame the other for needing someone to hold him and make him feel safe and Hide was honored that Kaneki felt safe enough around him to ask him to indulge him in that part of his needs.

“That’s not weird at all! I’d love to, seriously,” the blonde responded, his face almost hurting at how happy he felt. Kaneki looked up at the blonde self-consciously, searching his face for any kind of lie. After seeing just how enthusiastic the other was he allowed himself a relieved smile, moving aside so Hide could crawl over to the top of his bed with the book.

“I have one condition though. If you feel like I’m holding you too tightly or you feel like you need space, let me know okay?” Hide responded before he held his arms open wide for the smaller to scoot back against him.

“O-Okay,” Kaneki said, a light blush dusting across his cheeks as he leaned back against Hide’s chest, his bony shoulder blades digging against him in a strangely comfortable way. The blonde wrapped his arms around his skinny waist slowly, adjusting his grip so that he could break away with ease, but tight enough so that he still felt like he was being held. Hide rested his chin on top of Kaneki’s head, closing his eyes for a moment to let his scent wash over him, providing him his own sense of peace. He smelled lightly of clean linen, vanilla, and books, a smell Hide made effort to memorize.

Kaneki sighed, silently agreeing that this felt extremely nice, the tension leaving his body with every minute that passed as Hide opened up the book and began to read. It was a few pages in that Hide leaned forward, checking to make sure Kaneki was still comfortable, and he realized his eyes were closed, a small smile gracing his lips as he allowed Hide’s voice to paint the story’s world inside his mind. Oh god he’s absolutely beautiful, Hide thought to himself, hastily picking back up on his reading in hopes the other wouldn’t catch him staring.

~

The two of them sat like that with Hide reading until it was time for dinner, both of them reluctantly pulling away from the other, especially Kaneki who grumbled about wanting five more minutes in a half-asleep daze. It took Hide poking and tickling his sides gently to get him up and moving and he even got an adorably sleepy pout out of the deal. The two of them sat together again at dinner, and this time Kaneki was the one to interrogate Hide on his hobbies.

“Well you already know I like manga…I’ve tried many things in the past like learning new languages or learning how to play guitar. I’m a huge music fanatic,” Hide said in between bites of his dinner.

“Music? What kind of bands do you like?” Kaneki asked in interest.

“Depends on my mood. Sometimes I like Jpop or American pop. I am very big on Backstreet Boys, One Ok Rock, My First Story, Radwimp. Some milder ones I like are Radical Face, Sleeping At Last, Death Cab for Cutie, Of Monsters and Men,” Hide listed off at the top of his head, waving his fork around.

“Lots of English bands, I’ve heard some of them,” Kaneki noted with a small nod, his gray eyes sharp and focused as if he was committing everything Hide said to memory, “I know some Sleeping At Last mostly from the music therapy they’ve been trying on me.”

“Yeah I’m studying foreign languages in school with a heavy focus on English. I thought listening to more English bands would help me get the hang of the language easier,” the blonde explained, “I also listen to a lot of sound track like music with no lyrics if I’m studying something.”

“I could never multi-task like that,” Kaneki nodded, a small pout on his lips. “You must really miss your music, most of the songs they have back on the unit is lyric-less to promote relaxation and decrease possibly triggering someone.”

Hide scratched the back of his neck, feeling a lump begin to form in his throat as he remembered watching them take away his phone, promising to keep it safe until he was discharged. He depended on music throughout most of his life and though he went through many devices in order to listen to music, his phone had been around the longest.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have mentioned it,” Kaneki said shamefully, pulling Hide out of his thoughts. When the blonde looked over at him he saw Kaneki staring sympathetically at him.

“Ah it’s okay. I’ll get over it,” he said, taking a sip out of his carton of milk to try and get rid of the lump in his throat. Kaneki didn’t look convinced but didn’t pry any further on the subject.

“So what do they have you doing here?” Kaneki asked trying to stay on lighter topics but also wanting to know when he would be busy during the day.

“Well early in the mornings on weekdays I get my vitals checked, then they have me sit in this little room to watch online lectures on my college classes and finish up homework. After that they have me see my counselor at least twice a week…I guess they’re debating on whether or not to shove me in a group therapy thing. They’re also gonna try out an antidepressant on me,” the blonde responded, watching Kaneki wrinkle his nose up in response.

“That sucks. They’ve been trying everything on me. They take my vitals every morning and check my weight. They have me on an antipsychotic because I hear voices and have hallucinations, an antidepressant that can help with anxiety, vitamins to help keep me healthy because I suck at eating. I have individual counseling sessions because I don’t like being in a group of people, they’ve been trying a combination of therapies on me from music, to art, and CBT therapy,” Kaneki responded, his nose still wrinkled, “I think most of the drugs they give people just create more side effects which need more pills to counteract those side effects.”

“So you’re saying I’m in for a lot of fun?” Hide asked with a small smirk.

“Yeah, but who knows, maybe it’ll work good for you.”

“I could just hide it under my tongue or something and spit it out when no one is looking.”

“Don’t try it. Yomo is very good at figuring out whether or not you actually took them.”

“Yomo?”

“The tall, brawny white haired one,” Kaneki explained.

“Shit.”

“You better behave Hide. Besides most of the side effects should taper off in a week or so.”

“And if I don’t behave?” Hide asked, raising his eyebrow challengingly.

“Then you’ll have me to answer to.”

“And what is little ol’ you gonna do to me?”

“I’ll sit on you and force you to choke them down.”

“That sounds kind of kinky.”

“Oh my god Hide.”

~

The two of them hung out some more when they got back to their unit but began to move a lot slower when they realized they would have to separate to their own rooms very soon. It was around seven that Hide was called up to the little window at the side of the nurse’s station for his antidepressant and Kaneki followed him, deciding to make good on his threat. The staff member passing out medication, a long, black-haired woman, gave him a very small plastic cup that had a white, circular pill in it and a styrofoam cup of water. Since Kaneki was around as well, the nurse also handed him his pills which filled up half of the small plastic cup and a cup of water.

Hide smirked and bumped his own cup of water against Kaneki’s, chirping out a quick. “Cheers!” before quickly taking his own pill, one eye opened to catch Kaneki’s reaction which was to roll his eyes and take his own cocktail of drugs. The two of them then were forced to open their mouths to show the staff that they have in fact taken their pills, but Hide made it a point to stick his tongue out at Kaneki as well and cross his eyes. Kaneki nearly choked on the rest of his water in response.

“See? I took it. So do I get a sticker or something?”

“You get a congratulations for making him laugh,” the staff member responded with a soft smile.

“Don’t encourage him Irimi,” Kaneki coughed out as he continued to glare at Hide who wore a stupid grin on his face. Kaneki huffed and walked away giving Hide a nice view of the way his butt swayed a little from side to side when he walked. Dammit, even his butt is cute, the blonde thought to himself as he trailed after him.

“I didn’t say you could follow me,” Kaneki teased as he walked back to his room.

“Didn’t need to. Now that you started talking to me, you’re stuck with me forever,”Hide smirked.

“Well you can follow me all you want, I’m not forgiving you for nearly making me choke to death.”

“That’s fine by me, or I can talk enough for both of us and then some.”

“Well what if I shut you out of my room?” Kaneki asked, quickly stepping inside and closing the door in Hide’s face. He waited a few moments before opening it up a crack to look at Hide’s reaction which was simply to sit in front of the door like a stray puppy. The blonde smiled and batted his eyes up at Kaneki who pouted in mock anger in response. He sighed and opened his door back up so the blonde could skip in.

“Out of curiosity, what can I do to make you forgive me again?”

“Tell me a bedtime story,” Kaneki responded, walking over to his bed before he sat on it cross-legged. The staff member that was currently following Kaneki around and keeping tabs on him actually sat outside of his room, giving the two some privacy which both were grateful for. Hide was actually surprised that they trusted him, a new admit, with someone like Kaneki, but he sure as hell wasn’t taking this for granted.

“Alright. Once upon a time, there was this guy with white hair, that asked this other guy with crappily dyed blonde hair to tell him a bed time story. Little did that guy know, blondie was awful at telling normal stories, let alone bed time stories. So, ya know what happened then?”

“I was severely disappointed?” Kaneki raised an eyebrow.

“Yep. I’m sorry. I suck. The end. Wow you’re really good at this,” Hide responded with a dorky grin.

“Okay dork, you didn’t have to make up one on the spot. You could’ve just grabbed the book we were reading earlier and read that.”

“Uhm okay harsh, I was expecting more like, Oh no Hide your stories are really wonderful, tell me another! You know I worked super hard on that one. I spent a sleepless night trying to come up with that and this is the thanks I get!? Wow Kaneki, your words wound me.”  
Kaneki blinked and deadpanned, “You done throwing your tantrum?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Hide responded with sass, “But in all honesty yeah, I am. You look adorable when you’re so done with my shit.”

“Well you’re lucky I have a weakness for guys and freckles,” Kaneki mumbled with gritted teeth under his breath.

“Whoa wait, what was that!?”

“Nothing!”

“No say that again, I could really use the ego boost!”

“I said it was nothing and you have a big enough ego for both of us!”

“Oh my god you’re blushing so hard! If it helps I thought your butt was cute!”

“Oh my god Hide!” Kaneki yelped before throwing his pillow at Hide’s face.

~

Before Hide knew it, he was back in his room under cold, white sheets, the cold numbness spreading back into his bones. He was left alone with his own thoughts. While he had the warmer thoughts of Kaneki to take up some space in his head, he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong, there was something prickling in the back of his head, some unwanted thought or fear bubbling to the surface. Hide closed his eyes tightly, deciding that maybe if he just went to bed and ignore it that it would go away. It did go away, at least for most of the night but Hide was right about the approaching wave from the back of his mind. It washed over him in his usually most peaceful time of sleep, taking advantage of his vulnerability and drove him down under, sending his mind reeling in an incoherent nightmare of screaming, of blood, of cold darkness. Of her screams. Of his own screams. His parents screaming at him that he wasn’t enough. Kaneki screaming at him.

When Hide woke up it was like he didn’t even sleep at all, his body felt so heavy and his mind seemed disconnected from the rest of his body. It was with great difficulty that he got out of bed. He let the nurse take his vitals in a fog before he was escorted to that little room to get some college work done. Even though he heard the voice of his professors resonating out from the cheap earbuds they gave him, he couldn’t comprehend a single word they said. His head was mush but he could feel something bubbling deep inside him, just waiting to explode to the surface. He wasn’t sure what it was and he had a feeling he should’ve been concerned, but his mind just couldn’t make him care.  
He left that room without doing anything productive and he shuffled back to his room to collapse on his bed. He stared at that white wall in front of him again, the feeling deep inside him becoming more and more pronounced but Hide just didn’t have the energy to deal with it. He could feel it writhing around, could feel his body slowly tensing up as time passed. He hated it. How cold everything felt, a lot colder than how it should’ve been. It disturbed him greatly.

Before he knew it, it was lunchtime, but the thought of food made Hide want to throw up and he doubted his body was going to work with him like it did this morning. It’s kind of funny really. He knew difficulty getting up out of bed was a symptom of depression, and while it had been difficult for him on his darkest days, he’d always managed to get up. Now he couldn’t get up. He just couldn’t. Even with the staff member coming in trying to coax him to get up, he couldn’t hold on to any word he was saying. All he could do was stare straight ahead, his mind foggy and beginning to race at the same time. The thing inside him writhed around more ferociously. The staff member left in defeat. They went off without him.

The unit was very quiet, a perfect breeding ground for this thing inside of him to begin to wreak its havoc. His mind began to get noisier and no matter how hard his closed his eyes or tried to stamp them out they only screamed louder. Thoughts of worthlessness, that no matter how hard he fought he would lose. He would lose everything he had. He would lose Kaneki like he lost Akane. He could hear Akane cackling at him. Hide tried to fight against the waves, as hard as he could, but he felt like he was beginning to drown. He brought his arm out to study it to find it was trembling violently. His body was no longer within his control. He could feel burning cold fill his body and he clutched at the bed sheets, willing himself to stay centered. It was so cold. So cold it was burning him inside.

A whimper bubbled up from his throat, he could feel the scream that was lying in wait behind it. He tried to swallow them down but they kept coming, louder and louder. He could feel her cold, dead hands touching his body. He could hear her screaming. He could hear his father screaming. His mother. Feel their judgmental stares. Hide curled deeper into himself but having his head under the covers made it feel like he was suffocating so he kicked them off. He was still suffocating. He couldn’t get enough air in his lungs. He could feel her hands gripping his throat, her voice filling his head shouting how he wasn’t enough, he wouldn’t ever be enough, no matter what he did it would not be enough. His eyes began to sting along with his lungs, but no matter how hard he tried he couldn’t get enough air in. He was dying. He was sure of it. He was dying. The hand gripping the sheets was now scratching at his own neck, desperate to get more air in, in any way possible. Something had to be around his neck, preventing him from breathing.  
But he felt nothing and that freaked the shit out of him. Of drowning. Of not finding the cause to get rid of it, his heart trying to pound out of his chest. He was cold, he was scared, fuck he was so fucking scared right now. He was scared of being alone, of being cold, he was so many things and his mind wouldn’t just shut the fuck up. The screaming only got louder, and he realized as he felt his throat burn, that he was the one screaming. He couldn’t fucking stop, he just couldn’t fucking stop, and hewastryingsofuckinghardbuthecouldn’tstop. Justmakethisstopjustmakethisstopjustkillmegodpleasekillmeican’t!

He heard racing footsteps, of a man’s voice screaming that he needed help. Hide felt the cold ground underneath him. How the hell did he get on the ground. He felt someone touch him and he jerked violently away. He wanted to talk, but the screams just wouldn’t stop pouring out of his mouth and something warm was running down his face, his face was wet, he didn’t like it and he was so fucking cold.

Then Kaneki fell right in front of him, laying right down next to Hide so he could see his face and mouth clearly. Kaneki, I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe at all, I’m so cold, I’m so fucking cold and I’m scared and I don’t want to die yet, not like this, Hide wanted to shout. He felt something really warm and heavy cover him up and he felt the tension relax just a little bit. Kaneki snuggled his way under the warm mass, but pulled it away from their faces enough so it wouldn’t be too suffocating, even though Hide swore he was already suffocating.

“Hide, I need you to listen to me, listen to me,” Kaneki said loudly, above Hide’s own screaming and sobbing, “I need you to breathe with me. Look at me Hide, listen to me. I’m right here. I’m not going anywhere. When I say breathe in, breathe in through your nose and breathe out from the mouth. Look at me. I’ll do it with it. Do what I do.”  
“Breathe in,” Kaneki coached, exaggerating himself breathing in before holding his breath for a few seconds and breathing out through his mouth, making a soft woo sound. Hide tried to follow along but his breathing was so out of sync that the first time he was already exhaling when he was still supposed to be inhaling.

“It’s okay baby, keep trying, you’re doing really good. Keep doing what I do,” Kaneki said doing it again, this time Hide was following along with him. As Kaneki exhaled he praised Hide,” Good job, just like that. Again.”

Hide did it again, his mind felt dizzy and his body was jittery but he felt like he was coming back down, slowly but surely.

“I’m right here. I won’t leave. Again,” Kaneki exhaled and they did it again.

“I’m going to touch your face now, okay? Again,” Kaneki exhaled, repeating the pattern of inhaling with Hide and talking him through as he exhaled. Kaneki’s thumbs gently brushed against his cheeks to wipe away the water there before they moved backwards to rub small circles down Hide’s neck.

“What you had was a panic attack, might be a side effect of the drug they put you on. Again,” Kaneki explained through his exhale before breathing in with Hide again.  
“Don’t fight it, just let whatever is coming come and keep breathing like this,” Kaneki said, inhaling again with Hide and then back out with a soft woo. Hide found he was also making those noises, which strangely felt comforting to him as his body slowly unlocked itself again under the warm heavy, blanket covering them.

“It’ll pass. I promise it’ll pass,” Kaneki exhaled, his voice growing softer and softer as Hide began to calm down with his presence, the breathing therapy and the fingers work their way down his neck and to his shoulders.

“You feel better? Anything hurt?” Kaneki asked at their next exhale, becoming less announced when he saw Hide’s breathing was becoming natural on his own again. The blonde rested his forehead against Kaneki’s, the side of his body hurt from his impact, but other than that he was fine. Very exhausted but fine.

“Good. When you feel up to it, we’re gonna get into bed okay but when you feel like you can. Take your time,” Kaneki said, falling silent when he began to breathe alongside Hide. With his amber eyes half-lidded he noticed the staff that had gathered in his room, including Nishiki who stood off to the corner, looking to be a mixture of relieved and concerned. Yoshimura also came into the room to assess the situation.

“Kaneki, you have an individual counseling session,” the staff on his one to one mentioned.

“I’m not leaving him like this,” Kaneki responded in a no nonsense tone, “It can wait.”

“Kaneki you have to-“

“No, he’s right. It can wait. These two seem to be getting along great and Hide needs him right now. Help Nagachika into bed, keep checking on him every fifteen minutes but leave them alone,” Yoshimura said with a soft, sympathetic smile.

“But Yoshimura Kaneki can’t-“

“So far this is working out for the two of them. We don’t need to fix what’s not broken. We’ll keep an eye on them, but I have faith they’ll be okay,” the older man said, “Help Nagachika back into bed.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here is where the grammar gets a little dicey. I apologize in advance! Life hit us square in the face with final projects, finals, and work, but nontheless I hope you guys are enjoying the story so far! The song used in this chapter is Sun-Sleeping At Last.

“Honey you have to try and drink some water,” Kaneki coaxed gently but Hide wasn’t having it. His stomach was rolling and he swore he drank or ate a single thing he was going to lose it. It didn’t help that jittery feeling was back and he felt like he on the verge on another attack. He managed to sleep peacefully for a few hours, but then he found it hard to keep fully still.

“I can’t. I’m gonna puke,” Hide moaned, hiccupping a little in response.

“Do you want me to get you a bucket?”

“No don’t leave,” the blonde whined, feeling a surge of fear run through him before he groaned in frustration, “I thought this was supposed to make me feel better.”

“That’s the intended purpose, but sometimes certain medications don’t work for certain people. Sometimes you got to get through a load of shit for the first few days before you start feeling better. If it keeps making you feel this way they won’t keep you on it forever, I promise. We have to keep trying to get something in your body, you don’t want an IV,” Kaneki said, looking over at Nishiki pointedly. Nishiki got the message and got up from his bed to go hunt down something for Hide to vomit in.  
“I feel like I’m losing my mind. I can’t calm down. My skin is crawling,” Hide whined louder, feeling tears prickle in his eyes. He didn’t know what he was supposed to do in a situation like this!

“I know baby. I know. I’ve been there to, and it’ll get better. You’ll get through this and I’ll be right here with you,” Kaneki cooed, crawling up behind him to rub circles into his back, “Let’s do some more breathing exercises, maybe it’ll settle your stomach enough to try and drink something.”

“Dude your body is going to get dehydrated. I know it sounds fucking weird, but sometimes those pills make you feel sick to your stomach only because you’re starving or thirsty,” Nishiki blurted out, walking back in and placing a kidney shaped basin next to him. Hide only groaned in response, trying to make the room stop spinning around him. He was beginning to feel lightheaded which meant he was starting to hyperventilate again.

“I’m running to the rec center, need anything?” Nishiki asked Kaneki, nodding towards Hide, a silent message that asked if he could pick up anything that might make Hide’s situation better.

“If you could pick up some sprite…maybe some crackers or something. Granola bars?” Kaneki asked, his tone partially suggesting, seeing if something would sound good to Hide.

“Stop talking about food…”

“Stop whining. Try to vomit, maybe that’ll help.”

“Nishiki we’re not doing that.” Kaneki chided softly.

Nishiki rolled his eyes, before turning around and putting up the peace sign as he exited the room, “Whatever, just a suggestion. I’ll be back.”

Kaneki sighed and returned his attention to Hide who was whimpering and gripping at his hair to trying to control the panic rising up inside of him.

“Don’t fight it, just let it come out. Let’s do the breathing exercises again,” Kaneki cooed patiently, forcing Hide to lay his head in his lap as he covered him up with the heavy anxiety blanket he had grabbed from his room when he heard Hide’s screaming from before. Kaneki rubbed at the Hide’s wrists as he began to coach him through the breathing exercises again, coaxing his hands to let go of his hair before he could start tearing out the silky strands underneath. He wracked his brain for any other ideas to help the other calm down, before he remembered that he loved music. Though he wasn’t confident in how good his singing would be, Kaneki was willing to try anything out if it benefited Hide. It hurt his heart to see someone so bubbly before and cracking jokes, become reduced into a neurotic, depressed mess. He wondered how Hide had gotten here, and what kind of things he repressed deep inside him that was just now bubbling to the surface.

“With golden string, our universe was clothed in light. Pulling at the seams our once barren world now brims with life, that we may fall in love every time we open up our eyes. I guess space and time takes violent things, angry things, and makes them kind,” Kaneki began to sing, his voice wavering with uncertainty but also determination in calming Hide. He rubbed little circles down Hide’s neck, acrossed his jaw where tension was collecting and down to his shoulders as he continued to sing to him.

Hide’s whimpering which had steadily grew louder as he began to hear those voices screaming at him again, began to dim when he heard Kaneki begin to sing to him. It was a song he recognized from one of the bands he listened to, especially one in particular to help him sleep at night. He began to concentrate on the singing, his mind supplying the instrumentals to go along with the singing naturally. Kaneki felt the tightly strung muscles under him begin to loosen, encouraging him to continue with the song.

“We are the dust of dust. We are the apple of God’s eye. We are as infinite as the universe we hold inside,” Kaneki sung quietly, watching as those amber eyes that had hardened from the fear coursing through him melt into calm. Hide hadn’t realized just how badly his ears missed his music and he didn’t just how badly he needed this. To be sung to by a soft voice that only held love, sympathy, and concern for him. There was no hard edge to it, there was no tinge of annoyance at how ridiculous Hide was being. Had it been someone else, like his dad, he’d probably be slapped around a few times and have been told to shut up, to act like a man.

Hide closed his eyes and let the song take him away to a place where it was just him and Kaneki. They were in a world that was warm and safe, in a clearing, laying in the grass together and basking in the sunlight. The sun that bounced off of Kaneki’s hair made him glow even brighter, he looked like an angel. God, Hide didn’t know what he did to deserve someone like him. He thought he should be going through hell right now for trying to take his own life, for causing someone to take theirs, but instead he had Kaneki.

“With golden string, our universe was brought to life. That we may fall in love every time we open our eyes,” Kaneki sung the last part of lyrics, leaning over to check on Hide. Instead of pulling away after seeing his smoothed out, relaxed face, Kaneki used this opportunity to admire him. Though his eyes were puffy with dark circles lining underneath them, Kaneki couldn’t help but admire how thick of eyelashes the man had. It defined and made his eyes pop out more. Noticing the song was over, Hide slowly turned his head to look up at Kaneki. Though his amber eyes were still a little murky with fear, there was a small spark within his eyes which was a good start in the right direction, or at least Kaneki thought it was.

“You’re really good at singing. No one ever sang to me before,” Hide mumbled after a few moments of silently staring at each other, his mind felt as thick as molasses now.

“I’m glad you enjoyed it. I thought it would be good pay back for you reading to me. No one has done that for me in a long while,” Kaneki responded, gently wiping away a stray eyelash from Hide’s eye. He loved his eyes and not just because of the whole ‘they’re the portals to someone’s soul’ thing. He felt like he was being pulled into him and he was surprised when his head moved closer to Hide’s, like he was actually being pulled into Hide.

“Hey Hide?”

“Mmm?”

“You ever kiss anyone before?”

“Uhh…well that depends on the situation.”

“No dummy your mom doesn’t count,” Kaneki laughed, reading in between the lines.

“I wasn’t talking about my mom…” Hide responded, his eyes beginning to darken a little bit as he remembered the night Akane…he couldn’t even put that label to it. Rape. He was raped. He knew he was, but he just couldn’t…

Kaneki’s eyebrows knitted together as he watched the light fade from Hide’s eyes and he began to have a spacey expression on his face, “You don’t have to talk about it. I’m sorry for bringing it up.”

“No…it’s okay…like…I never told anyone really the whole story before. I tried to tell my parents, but they didn’t believe me. Like…well I made friends with this one girl sophomore year. She was…really disturbed…came from an abusive alcoholic father…like I didn’t like like her… she was more so a friend,” the blonde said, turning back over to the wall. Kaneki kept staring at him, his eyebrows furrowed together but listened intently as Hide began to relay what happened with him and Akane very slowly. His tired mind puttering along as it tried to cut through the thick, honey his mind was reduced to. When he began to approach the part of being raped his body began to tense up and he stopped talking as the fear began to bubble back up.

“Hide?” Kaneki asked, concern lacing his voice as he threaded his hand through his. He didn’t speak again until Hide turned to look at him his eyes beginning to widen up again in terror. That word. You usually heard it as a man doing something to a woman. Not the other way around. If it was the other way around, people would just tell you that you were lucky. You’d be congratulated. Been told that they were drinking and that was what happened when you drank. You should be happy that she didn’t get pregnant.  
Kaneki gave him a soft smile, “It’s okay…just remember to breathe. Take your time. I’m right here.”

Hide took a few deep breathes before continuing, but he kept his eyes trained on Kaneki. Trying to will himself to stay centered in reality as he described what she did, why he let it happen and his feelings behind it. Kaneki looked like he was about to cry when he started to talk about Akane, but he didn’t shed a tear. He was determined to stay rooted, to be there for Hide. He already talked about his own experiences and problems with a therapist and even though it still caused him a lot of grief, he knew Hide needed to know he could talk to someone without that person getting triggered over what he was saying. He was going to try as hard as he could to stay here mentally and physically for Hide.

“It’s okay baby. I know honey. It’s not your fault,” Kaneki responded, his own voice beginning to waver as he watched Hide slowly crumble underneath him. It amazed him how easy he made it seem to smile and joke around, and yet he had all this pain festering inside him. He had nobody who would take the time out of their day to just sit, listen to him and believe in what he was saying.

“Yes it is,” Hide responded, his voice choking up as tears began to gather in his eyes, “I rejected her and ignored her and her texts…a-and t-two weeks afterwards…s-she was standing on the roof of the school…looking at me…before she jumped a-and f-fell…h-her body hit the pavement…her leg was twisted up and there wa-was so m-much blood…”

Kaneki felt the blonde start to shake violently underneath him and the grip on his hand tightened. He felt like his heart was being ripped out of him as he watched all the color drain out of Hide’s face, his amber eyes seemed to darken from light brown to pitch black. Hide swallowed hard, feeling bile rise in the back of his throat. A repeat of after the police officers left his house that day and how he locked himself in the bathroom.

“I-I’m g-“ Hide managed to choke out before his body violently convulsed. Luckily Kaneki watched him carefully enough that he got the memo and held the basin underneath his chin just in time for Hide to expel everything that was in his stomach.

“Shhh…it’s okay baby…” Kaneki cooed, rubbing the blonde’s back soothingly as his muscles contracted painfully under his fingers. He finally let his own tears run down his face, “Get it all out shhh…”

After a few moments the convulsing stopped and Hide used this opportunity to take in a few gulps of oxygen. The way his stomach was contracting painfully though, it wasn’t long until he stuck his head back towards the basin for another round. It was like his body was trying to cleanse itself, that or try to get all his insides to escape out of his throat, he didn’t know which. Either way, he didn’t view this as a spiritual cleansing experience like some people probably would’ve. It sucked. End of story. It wasn’t pretty or inspiring. None of this shit was. When stuff stopped coming up, his stomach continued to try to purge itself and Hide wondered if it was ever going to stop.

Kaneki stayed close by, rubbing his back and whispering sweet nothings to him for the several moments it took until Hide’s body finally stopped retching, his chest heaving up and down shakily as he tried to compose himself. Kaneki moved his hands upwards to play with Hide’s hair, giving him a few moments to collect himself before saying, “Let’s get you up and wash out your mouth.”

Kaneki helped Hide sit up and gave him the glass of water he tried to get him to drink from earlier. Hide shakily took the cup of water and squished the cold liquid in his mouth a couple of times before spitting it out in the basin, thankful that it at least got most of the acidic nastiness out of his mouth. His body still quaked from the after effects of vomiting and also because the sweat was now cooling against his skin. Disgusting. He wondered how Kaneki even made it through without running away in disgust.

“I’m sorry…” Hide said, his voice raspy as he leaned against Kaneki in exhaustion.

“Don’t be. It’s totally okay,” Kaneki said with a soft smile, getting up to set the basin down on the small desk the hospital provided in every room before moving to Hide’s closet, “I’m gonna see about getting you a new shirt to wear.”

“That was disgusting…”

“Yes, it was, but sadly as human beings our bodies do disgusting things sometimes. Do you at least feel a bit better?” Kaneki asked, he grabbed a shirt off a hanger before he walked back to Hide who began to weakly take his shirt off.

“Tired…” Hide responded with a shudder as he took the shirt offered to him and slipped it on.

“You still didn’t answer my question from earlier,” Kaneki reminded a small, tired smile tugged on his lips.

“What was that again?”

“Is it alright if I kiss you?”

Hide raised an eyebrow, “I literally just tried to throw up my internal organs and you still want to kiss me?”

“I’ve seen and read more disgusting things. Plus, you washed out your mouth, and it’s not like we’re going to use tongue,” Kaneki defended as he leaned closer.

“I bawled, screamed, and acted like a little kid…”

“So? We all need to have moments like that and it seems like yours was overdue. Besides, I cried and acted like a little kid in front of you…and you still hung around me,” Kaneki rebutted.

“You’re not going to leave me alone? Or scream at me? Or think I’m a burden?”

“No. Are you?”

“No..” Hide responded his voice dropping, inching his face closer. His heart was racing, but not out of fear this time. It was out of anticipation. Kaneki looked up into Hide’s amber eyes before closing his own and tilting his head to close to gap between them to press his soft lips against Hide’s chapped ones. It took a few moments for Hide’s mind to connect the fact that, yes, this beautiful little angel was kissing him. After all the pathetic and disgusting stuff he just witnessed, this guy was freaking kissing him. When it did connect he swore the shattered pieces of his world pieced back together. The gray of this world lifted, and his insides felt warm and complete. He felt the rush, the feeling of being alive but without having to put his life in danger this time. He felt the warmth flood through his entire body, tears began to flow down his face, but for a different reason. He felt like a robot that just stood off in the corner of room, the eyes dark, hollow, dead, but when his lips connected with his own the robot sparked to life.

As Kaneki pulled away and looked at Hide, whose eyes were blown wide, the murkiness lifting, a soft laugh escaped his lips, his own gray eyes filling with tears that held love and adoration.

“Don’t cry you dummy you’re gonna make me cry,” Kaneki sniffled.

“But if you cry I’m gonna cry harder,” Hide whined as he began to sob because Kaneki was crying, and he was crying because of him, which made him feel bad but at the same time that gaze he gave him just melted his heart into a pile of mush.

“I told you not to cry,” Kaneki whimpered as he began to sob as well but reached up and tried to wipe away Hide’s tears who was trying to do the same for him. They ended up having to give up and instead just embraced each other as they sobbed against the other. Hide tired out first and fell back on the bed, pulling Kaneki down with him who rested his head on his chest as he continued to sob.

“That’s not fair. You look beautiful when you cry to,” Hide rasped out, his eyes half-lidded as he preoccupied himself with staring at Kaneki and wiping away his remaining tears with a thumb.

“Shut up you weirdo,” Kaneki laughed through his tears as he lightly flicked at Hide’s hand.

“No. It’s true so I’m gonna say it,” he laughed back.

"Ya know…I never really knew if I liked girls or boys. I mean, I still don’t know but whatever this is…I like this. I don’t know what love really is…but I think whatever this is…this is what it would be…” Hide said after a few moments of just staring at each other, his words slurring together in his exhaustion.

“Wow Hide, you’re so poetic,” Kaneki said softly with small smirk at he blinked back tiredly into Hide’s eyes, “I can agree with that though…”

“Kaneki?” Hide yawned, his eyes barely keeping open.

“Mmm?”

“I love you.”

Kaneki’s eyes widened, and his gray eyes lit up a little bit in surprise that Hide actually said it. After a few moments of his mind buffering, Kaneki smiled softly back at his tired little love, “I love you to Hide…now go to bed.”

~

Hide fell into…well he wouldn’t really call it a fitful sleep. He woke up in a blur here and there, sometimes in a panic until he looked over and saw Kaneki was beside him. Then it would be like someone gave him a tranquilizer and he’d be out again. The first couple of times Hide woke up, Kaneki slept curled up beside him. The next several times he jolted awake, his eyes wide and unfocused. Kaneki would also jump out of reflex, pulled out of a book he’d been reading and look over at him before giving him a reassuring smile, then Hide would be out again. It must’ve been the twentieth time he woke up when Kaneki looked at him in concern and he found some staff members were behind him.

Whoa wait what? What was happening?

“Hey honey, don’t freak out okay? You’re just really dehydrated, so they’re gonna hook you up to an IV for a little while,” Kaneki explained softly, noting the confusion and fear in Hide’s eyes. Hide stared up at him in confusion, not quite registering what he was talking about. His head was pounding, and his mouth felt like a desert, but he felt a little comfort just by the sight of Kaneki and was happy he wasn’t being taken anywhere by the staff members.

It was when he felt the cold, wetness of the alcohol pad being rubbed on his hand and noticed the needle they were unwrapping from the packaging that his eyes widened. He jerked away suddenly very alert. It wasn’t like he was afraid of needles…he just…well he usually never had to be around them and in his disoriented state he thought they were gonna poison him with more drugs or sedate him or something.

“Nu-uh! No! Get that away from me!” Hide shouted.

“No Hide, it’s okay. Hide look at me,” Kaneki said, trying not to look at the needle himself. He was scared of needles and loathed the sight of them. Instead he moved closer, focusing his attention on calming Hide who looked between the staff and then back at Kaneki in uncertainty. There’s no way he was going to let them stick a needle in him when his guard was down!

“Hide, listen to me,” Kaneki said again softly before he explained slowly and patiently again, “You’re dehydrated. Remember that water I tried to get you to drink and you didn’t? Then you threw up a bunch so now you don’t have a lot of water in your body. I know you’re confused, and having a needle stuck into your skin isn’t fun. That’s a normal feeling, but you’re safe, I’m right here. They need to put that needle in you, so they can restore the water you lost in your body and you’ll feel a lot better when they do.”

“They’re gonna try and poison me…” Hide mumbled, glaring at the staff members.

“No they’re not Hide. It’s not poison, it’s saline. It’s made up of the things we need in our bodies,” Kaneki explained as he took Hide’s hand in his own, “Trust me baby, I haven’t lied to you, yet have I? You can squeeze my hand if you need to.”

“Kay…” Hide mumbled, letting the staff grab his unheld hand, but he stared at them skeptically and watched everything they did. When he saw the needle go in and felt a tiny stab of pain he felt fear begin to fill him. He knew looking back on it, it was kind of childish feeling fear over a tiny needle; but in his state of mind if someone asked him to write out his name, he’d probably end up just staring back at them like a brain-dead robot. 

“Neki,” Hide whined, looking over to pout at Kaneki who resisted the urge to squeal at him because he looked so freaking cute with his bedhead and childish confusion.

“You’re okay honey. You’re doing very good,” Kaneki smiled encouragingly and squeezed his hand.

“Your eyes look like moons…”

“Thank you Hide,” Kaneki chuckled, enjoying the delusional Hide, especially now that he wasn’t freaking out.

“I didn’t mean that as an insult, I’d love to be mooned by you Neki.” Hide said, thinking his moon compliment backfired. I mean usually someone didn’t compare people’s eyes to moons, except maybe if you were Panic At the Disco.

Kaneki snorted and bit his lip, feeling bad that he was laughing at Hide in his mental state, “I’m glad you feel that way Hide.”

“My eyes probably look like shit.”

“No, I wouldn’t say that. They look like melted chocolate sometimes, or amber,” Kaneki responded with an endearing smile.

“I don’t have insects in my eyes.”

“No, you don’t, and that’s okay, I’m just comparing the color.”

“Why are you crying?”

“I’m not crying Hide I’m laughing.”

“Why?”

“You’re being so adorable right now.”

Hide laughed dumbly at that before giving Kaneki his own compliment, “Your hair looks as fluffy as a bunny’s butt.”

“Thank you Hide,” Kaneki laughed, “Yours looks like a crazy, strung out sunflower right now.”

Hide gasped at that,” Oh my god! I love sunflowers! Don’t try and eat em though, they don’t taste nice.”

Kaneki doubled over in laughter and managed to stutter out, “I-I promise I won’t! Oh honey, if only you could hear yourself. You need to go back to sleep.”  
The staff members got the IV in with no problem and were gathering their stuff to leave.

“I don’t wanna. My hand hurts and what if you leave?”

“I won’t leave, I promise. I know it hurts but you have to keep it in okay?”

“Pinky promise?”

“Oh, I’ll do more than that,” Kaneki responded before leaning in to kiss Hide’s lips and then his hand with the IV in it, “We’ll promise it on the kiss.”

“I like that much better. My body gets fuzzy and warm like a bunny’s butt when you kiss me,” Hide admitted, watching as Kaneki bit his lip again to prevent laughing at him.

“I’m glad you think so. It makes me feel like that to. I think. I don’t know what bunnies feel like. I love you Hide but you definitely need some sleep. We can talk more when you wake up again.”

“Okay. I love you Neki.”

“I love you to Hide.”


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lots of nakedness in dis one. I swear to god there is plot!

When Hide woke up again he felt quite a bit better, a little more down to earth. A hand rested on the side of head, stroking the tiny hairs near his ear and twirling them around a finger, sometimes wandering down to trace his jawline. Kaneki sat next to his head on the bed, sketching on a piece of paper with a heavy book on his lap to give him something hard to draw on. Hide watched him for about a minute, trying to find the energy inside of him to sit up but also because he wanted to admire the other. He watched the way he bit his lip gently; his eyebrows furrowed a tiny bit as he contemplated the drawing in front of him and admired the way his hair curled around his ear. It seemed a lot curlier today and he wondered if maybe the other had forgotten to brush through his hair while he was taking care of Hide.

Feeling someone watching him, the gray-eyed beauty turned to look down at Hide, his face smoothing over and a small smile gracing his lips.

“I was wondering when you’d wake up again. You’ve been out for quite awhile this time around. Are you feeling better?” Kaneki asked.

“Yeah,” Hide yawned as he raised his arms over his head and outwards and spread his legs to stretch.

“Do you really need all that space to stretch?” Kaneki asked in mock irritation as he was pushed up against the side of the bed, he winced when he heard a few vertebrae crack audibly from Hide and the heavy sigh of pleasure that left his lips.

“No...” Hide responded with a stupid grin as he rubbed at his eyes.

“Ugh put your arms down, you smell awful,” Kaneki whined playfully, although he wasn’t necessarily lying. It had been a couple days since the blonde showered.

“Coming from the guy who forgot how to brush his hair. Seriously have you looked at yourself in the mirror this morning?” Hide retorted but lowered his arms anyways. he didn’t need to sniff himself to know he smelled awful.

“Says the guy who looks like he was struck by a lightning bolt,” Kaneki said but combed through his hair self-consciously.

“I’m just making a new fashion statement…”

“Sure you are. Lunch starts in about an hour and before you complain, yes you are going to try and eat something. It’s been two days. So, take a shower and brush your teeth. As much as I adore you to pieces your morning breath is absolutely the worst,” Kaneki said in a motherly tone before patting the blonde’s head.

“Ewwghh…food,” Hide whined, still not having much of an appetite.

“Yeah, ewwghhh nourishment. The things we need to live and survive on,” Kaneki responded distractedly since he had went back to his drawing.

“What are you drawing?” Hide asked, looking over Kaneki’s shoulder, “Ewghhh centipede. House centipedes are cuter ya know. They even clean themselves! They’re like the cats of the insect world!”

“Hide! Shower!” Kaneki scolded with a pout, trying to hide his drawing from the other.

“Alright jeez!” Hide said, raising his hands up in surrender. He tried to stand up only to have his knees buckle underneath him and his vision go black. When his vision returned he was on the floor.

“Oh my god Hide you okay!?” Kaneki yelped as he crawled over the bed to assess Hide’s injuries, “This is my fault, I should’ve known you might’ve been a little weak- “

“I’m fine. It’s not your fault. I should’ve known to,” the blonde laughed it off, allowing Kaneki to help him stand again.

“Dude what the fuck was that!?” a voice called to reveal a disheveled Nishiki almost stumbling face first through the doorway. Once he found out the source of the noise was Hide and not some furniture falling, his face smoothed over into one of mild irritation (although Hide just thought that was his normal look), “Well well well, Shittychika joins us once again in reality. You reek.”

“Thanks, it’s a new musk I’m trying out called Medicated Induced Panic and Self Loathing. It’ll be coming to a store near you,” he retorted with a good-natured smirk. Nishiki rolled his eyes and walked closer to grab Hide’s other side to help him walk.

“Oh Nishiki, I didn’t know you cared!” came Hide’s dramatic reply.

“Don’t get full of yourself, with the sound you made hitting the floor and the way you smell I merely didn’t want you to squish your personal care taker. Honestly, it sounded like someone pushed the desk over,” the man growled out, not willing to admit he gave a shit about either of them. Kaneki busied himself by collecting a change of clothes and toiletries out of Hide’s closet. A small blush dusted itself across his cheeks about the part of being Hide’s personal care taker.

“Thanks babe,” Hide grinned when Kaneki walked over to hand him the neatly folded pile of things. He decided since Kaneki initiated the pet names first that it wouldn’t hurt if he called him some pet names as well.

Kaneki’s face flushed a bright red and he managed to sputter out some form of ‘your welcome, enjoy your shower’ before waving them off and turning away. Oh, so pet names were a weakness of his, Hide thought to himself.

“I wasn’t that bad, was I?” Hide asked once they were out of ear shot of Kaneki.

“Uh…well after a while you mellowed out, but yeah you were pretty fucked up.”

“I didn’t stress him out too much did I?”

“Honestly, dude you stressed us all out. It sounded like some guy was getting his limbs ripped off one by one when we all came back on the unit. I’m surprised you can even talk. I think it was a nice change of pace for him to focus his attention on someone else rather than himself though, “ Nishiki explained as he helped Hide to the front desk so that a staff member could unlock the bathroom and keep an eye on him.

“It lives!” came a shout over by the T.V. coming from Touka who looked over at the pair with Yoriko who lightly slapped her shoulder with a scolding look.

“I was wondering when the sun would finally make it shining appearance once again,” Shuu also called out.

“Congratulations, now you’re officially one of us, it totally sucks,” Kanae cheered sarcastically.

“One of us! One of us!” came Touka again with equal sarcasm.

Hide blinked, a small blush spreading across his cheeks at being compared to the sun. That was a little…over the top? I mean he understood that his hair was super blonde, but saying he was the sun? Sounds fake but okay fam. It was Shuu that it came from though, he tended to be over the top and dramatic. He felt a little sense of the warm fuzzies that they cared enough to even comment on the fact that he was up and moving once again. Yomo was the one on duty that was free, so he took the IV out of Hide’s arm and led him down to the bathroom. Once there, he unlocked the bathroom and let Hide in, leaving the door open a crack sense he was still on suicide watch.

Each patient had fifteen minutes to shower. If you were on a one to one, the door had to be left open a bit so the staff in charge could peer inside every few moments to make sure you weren’t trying to kill yourself. If you weren’t on a one to one, the staff would knock every five minutes to which the patient had to respond in some way to make sure that they were once again, not killing themselves. If you went over the fifteen minutes, you had privileges taken away, such as going off the unit or some other little freedom they allowed here.

Hide walked over to the toilet, doing his business, which over the time he had spent here, he had sadly gotten used to doing while having someone look at him. It took a lot of water images and imagining he was back home going to the bathroom instead of being watched like a hawk in a mental institution to get him through those couple days. He couldn’t wait for the day when he could actually take a leak with full privacy again.

After that he slowly undressed, still worrying about his ability to balance and the fact he was still a little self-conscious of someone seeing him absolutely naked. He knew being in this line of work, they must’ve seen many naked bodies and have grown desensitized to it, but it didn’t mean Hide felt any less self-conscious. He stared at himself in the mirror, seeing the scars on his stomach, on the inside of his thighs where he ran his blade to watch himself bleed for the adrenaline rush. He cut himself in places he knew people wouldn’t usually see to keep from ruining his parent’s reputations because their kid was disturbed. Even though he loathed how they put their own reputations above his own needs, he found himself following their unspoken rule of being “perfect, well behaved, well-mannered, and intelligent” to an extent, even now.

Hide slowly stepped into the shower, allowing a few moments of bliss as the warm water hit his back as he reflected a little on his past.

As a little boy Hide desperately tried to follow that unspoken rule, all for the sake of earning his parent’s love and affection. He knew he screwed up when the bed wetting began, and he tried desperately to try and make it stop but couldn’t seem to make it happen. After that, he tried to excel in other areas, by bringing home as many A’s as possible, by trying out for sports (and failing at them), or by giving them drawings, anything possible to try and get a simple ‘good job’ from them. It wasn’t enough though. Not compared to his older brother who didn’t wet the bed, who didn’t get scolded every morning from mom or dad because they needed to clean his bed sheets. He wasn’t the one who was blamed when they were sleep deprived and crabby because of his nightmares.

Since that didn’t work. He tried temper tantrums, especially in public. Sure, he was also crabby most of the time, due to lack of sleep on his end, so partially he had them because of that. He also craved their attention; even negative attention would be fine. That worked at first, his parents trying to calmly get him to calm down, aware of the eyes of the public on them. They couldn’t just smack him around in public. When they started to lose patience, Hide’s father dragged him off to the bathroom or the car and smacked him around a little bit. There was one particular temper tantrum that ended up being his last temper tantrum. He was throwing things off the shelves at the local super market and his father was particularly sleep deprived from a busy day at the hospital. His father took ahold of his arm, gripping it so hard Hide thought it was going to break. His father dragged him behind an alleyway and punched him hard in the face. He then smacked him around a couple of times, calling him an ungrateful child, a pain in the ass, the worst child ever, that if he didn’t stop crying now he was going to beat the shit out of him (although he thought he was already doing that). All in all, that was the first time his father punched him and his last temper tantrum he ever threw. After that he let his rage fester inside and he stayed silent while at home. At school, he still followed that unspoken rule and acted like everything was fine.

The only time he acted out afterwards was through the panic attacks he had sometimes, but usually he was good about hiding those. They usually came around when he was super stressed about school. He remembered one class that gave him nightmares and he panicked before taking every exam. It was Asian History. He was already stressed from his home life and lack of support, he knew with his exam scores he wasn’t going to get an A in this class. When he saw that B on his report card, he thought his world was going to end right then and there. A Nagachika getting a B in a class? Unheard of! Of course, his parents were not impressed, he got a few knocks to the head and was told he was a lazy piece of shit. Then his mother enrolled him in cram school. While he hated the punishment, he was glad his world didn’t completely end.

Hide felt fear begin to rise in his throat, his new medication still making him a bit more sensitive than usual. He tried to busy himself with lathering himself up, washing his hair and remembering the breathing exercises Kaneki taught him. He imagined Kaneki’s voice telling him to breath in and to breathe out. Kaneki…god he wondered how he thought of him now. He showed such empathy and adoration even after everything he’s put him through, but what if he was just doing that because he felt bad for Hide? One could only handle so much of another person’s problems, his parents proved that.

Hide bit his lip and grabbed the shower handle and turned it far to the left, to go as warm as it possibly can. He used the blistering hot water burning his skin helped to keep him rooted to reality. Hide didn’t notice the water was turning his skin an angry red, too busy gritting his teeth and willing himself back into reality. God he just wanted to scream! This fucking antidepressant was making shit worse for him, he was sure of it! Yomo who had been watching the other’s form carefully every few minutes, noticed the way he was beginning to crumple in on himself. The amount of steam from the shower increased and the man could feel the room’s warmth from where he stood. He decided to trust the feeling in his gut and went in to check on Hide who was pressing his head against the wall of the shower, his nails biting into his arm, making angry red welts appear on his arm.

“That’s enough,” Yomo said sternly, turning off the water in one swift motion before taking Hide’s towel and wrapping the younger in it.

“No no no no! I-I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry, don’t be angry! I can’t help it! I’m trying! Fuck I’m trying so hard I can’t make it stop,” the blonde said, his voice raised in pitch as he began to reach hysteria. Yomo pulled the younger against him whose legs were beginning to give out and made him sit down on the toilet.

“Then stop trying to fight against it. Acknowledge it’s happening, but it’s going to pass. You have a lot of pain stored up inside of you that needs to be released. Let it be released,” the man responded.

“This is stupid! I’m fucking stupid! I shouldn’t be freaking out like this!”

“It is not stupid. Everyone has fears, including me. Now, let’s focus on your breathing. I’m going to count to eight, I want you to breathe in as much as you can until I tell you to breathe out. I want you to imagine the fear inside of you escaping through your lungs when you breathe out,” the man said in a calm, clear voice.

Even though the man looked like he could take on the whole unit by himself and he scared the shit out of Hide, he had to admit, he had a very calming voice.

“Ready? 1…2…3…4…5…6…7…8…”

Hide breathed in, even though his lungs felt like they were going to explode when he hit 5, he managed to make it to 8 but barely.

“Breathe out. 1…2…3…4…5…6…7…8…”

Hide breathed out, imagining something like black smoke pouring out of his lungs. He didn’t know what fear would actually look like, but he figured black smoke was a good representation.

“Again…”

They repeated the process. This time Hide found it easier for his lungs to get closer to 8 before they felt like they were going to explode. He imagined more black smoke coming out of his lungs. They did it again Again. And again. And again. And again, until Hide was breathing normally again. As Yomo let Hide sit and collect his thoughts he took his arm in his hand to look over the scratches on his arm, one scratch, deeper than the others, slowly dripping blood down, down the side of his arm, slowly curving around until a drop of red hung down, down like a teardrop dangling down someone’s chin before splashing to the floor. His skin still burned a fiery, tingling red that stung a little bit when the man touched him.

“Alright. Let’s get you dressed first, then we’ll take care of this,” Yomo decided. His tone held no judgement as he helped Hide stand, who was still a little wobbly on his feet. He let Hide dress himself but kept an eye on him in case he was about ready to fall. Once he was ready, the man led him to a chair out near the dining area with the small kitchenette each unit had (for snacks, not for meals that they went off unit for) and gestured him to sit down, before going behind the nurse’s desk where he retrieved a first aid kit. Then the man sat down in front of him, before unwrapping an alcohol pad to clean up the scratches. Hide didn’t even bat an eye, he just watched him dress his wound with dulled eyes, the fog of depression beginning to cloud up his mind after he sufficiently depleted some of his energy with his panic attack.

After Yomo was done dressing his wound he sat there for awhile longer before asking, “Is there anything you want to talk about?”

Hide looked up, his amber eyes hardening a bit in distrust, but Yomo stared right back at him, his gaze piercing but unwavering. Hide was tired of all these older adults trying to pry into his life, why the hell would they believe in whatever he had to say anyways? His parents didn’t. They held each other’s gaze for a good full minute before Hide was the first to look away in discomfort. Yomo’s intense stare making all the things he wanted to say bubble up in his throat. He swallowed hard to squish them back down and set his jaw stubbornly.

The man nodded before leaning back in his chair, continuing to stare at Hide for a few moments more. Hide closed his eyes to try and shut out the prying eyes, but he could feel it burning into his soul. Fuck, this guy was the type where all he had to do was stare at someone to get them to speak! Just as Hide was about to open his mouth, the staff member broke the silence.

“I can’t make you do anything, but I think it would be wise for you to stop hiding behind the front you put up. A friend of mine said we all needed a mask that we never take off, but I believe after a certain point you begin to lose who you are behind that mask. You forget how to feel and how to deal with the emotions you have,” the man said before scooting back his chair, leaving the blonde alone to sit there and process what he said. It made sense, but he wondered what that meant for him since he hid behind his mask for most of his life. Did he even know who he was before he put up his façade? Was there really anyone there at all or was he always just ‘nobody’? Maybe it was too late for him.

~

“So how are things today Hide? I heard it’s been quite an eventful couple of days for you,” Marude asked patiently.

“Yeah, thanks for that. Your happy pills are not doing what they’re supposed to be doing,” Hide said bitterly. He was sitting sideways on the chair he was in, curled up and  
resting his head on his knees while staring at the wall.

“I see that. It does take time, but we’re going to cut down your dosage to try and make things a bit more bearable for you. Anything in particular bothering you today?”

“The fact that I’m here talking to you.”

“Why’s that?”

“I’m tired and I don’t feel like talking about my problems when they don’t fucking matter anyways.”

“What makes you think they don’t matter?”

“Well obviously you got all the information you need from my parents, why the fuck would it matter what I have to say?”

“I’m not interested in what they have to say, I’m interested in what you have to say and how you feel. Yes, they gave us information to go off of but that’s only their part of the story and just because they’re your parents doesn’t mean what they all say is completely true. As for what you say in here, it’s not going out of this room. You are not a minor anymore which means no matter how hard they try I can’t release any information and I’m bound by law to keep things confidential,” the man responded calmly but also sternly, “I feel like there is a hell of a lot more going on than what your parents say and I’m interested in hearing your part of the story.”

Hide allowed himself to relax a little bit. He felt a little calmer after what Marude said, but he still had his suspicions. He could just be telling him what he wanted to hear.

“Let’s start with your parents, we’ll go as deep as you want to. It seems like you feel a lot of resentment for them, can you tell me why?” the counselor pressed gently. Hide pursed his lips and began to play with his jacket sleeve. Kaneki suggested he wore it for his session after apologizing profusely about not returning it until now. He was glad he took up his suggestion, because the jacket smelled heavily of the other and when he closed his eyes and deeply inhaled he felt like Kanekiwas right beside him. Several moments passed in silence and Hide was genuinely surprised when he turned around and saw Marude still looking at him in interest. Creep, Hide thought to himself. What he didn’t know was that Marude was focusing on his body language which still gave him information to go off of, so it didn’t matter too much if he didn’t talk. It was only the second session after all.

Hide closed his eyes, feeling the words bubbling up deep inside him. He inhaled Kaneki’s scent again and allowed some of them to pass through his lips, “They lie. They worry more about their reputations being tarnished than the well being of me or my brother. They shoved it down our throats since we were old enough to understand what they were saying that we were to be nothing but perfect. We were supposed to be A students, to only speak when we were spoken to. If we had a problem, we were to grin and bear it, instead of talking about it. We were to hide it from everyone else.”

Marude nodded in understanding, using the moment of silence to speak up, “So it was like you had to act like grown ups at a young age.”

“Yeah. I guess.”

“So, what do they lie about specifically that tick you off?”

“About the problems I’ve had in the past or forming those problems in a way that saves their own asses from looking bad, but makes me look like the bad guy. They didn’t acknowledge the fact that I was having issues and didn’t want to deal with them.”

“What kind of problems did you have as a kid, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“In the past I had emotional issues…or I guess that’s what they called it. I acted out, temper tantrums. Got a little too hyperactive with things, wanted too much attention. Didn’t get good enough grades. Wet the bed. Nightmares. Basically, an obnoxious, rebellious kid that wouldn’t get far in life. More recently I dyed my hair, snuck out of the house when they wanted me to study and when I did I stayed out past curfew. Got drunk a couple of times,” the blonde sighed, closing his eyes exhaustion beginning to spread throughout his body.

“Where do you think those problems stem from?”

“Cuz I’m a fuck up,” Hide shrugged and said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

“Did you ever think maybe the times you were acted out was just you expressing the very emotions your parents wanted you to hide? Kids throw their share of temper tantrums, it’s just a part of growing up. Kids crave attention and even though it can get annoying sometimes they can get hyperactive. It’s a part of being a kid.”

Hide shrugged again, “Okay, then what about getting my hair dyed or getting drunk?”

“You were a teenager, teenagers all rebel to an extent. They experiment, they try to find ways to express themselves as an individual. That doesn’t necessarily make you a fuck up,” Marude explained before looking at the time, “Alright, we’re running out of time, but I think we got something we can work with today. From the way it sounds your parents were very strict. I think you have every right to feel resentment. I’m interested in going in a little deeper with this topic in the future. It sounds like you might have some perfectionist tendencies and that you’re dealing with emotions that you’re not used to dealing with, so I think we should continue exploring that together in future sessions. We’re going to half your dose and see if that alleviates some of the side effects, allow your body to build up tolerance, and slowly increase it up again. You seem like a very intelligent, friendly person to be around and I think a lot of your problems are manifesting from the emotions and problems you haven’t faced head on yet. We’ll slowly go through that in future sessions.”

“Oh joy…sounds like a blast…” Hide sighed, feeling tired and a little sick to his stomach as he shuffled off behind Marude to be escorted back to his unit. When he got there, he felt butterflies flutter around in his stomach and warmth fill him when he saw Kaneki had been waiting, sitting next to the door for the blonde’s return.

“It looks like you made a new friend,” Marude commented, nodding a few times, though Hide couldn’t tell if he approved of their relationship or not. Hide ignored him, preferring to keep his eyes trained on Kaneki, a genuine smile lighting up his features as Kaneki looked up from his book at the sound of the unit doors opening. His own face lit up in a smile as Hide strode closer to him. Kaneki smiled and nodded at the counselor, acknowledging Marude who strode over to the nurse’s desk to talk to the staff.

“So, did you hear the news?” Kaneki asked, biting his lip to contain his excitement to just blurt it out as he stared at Hide.

“News? Is it good news or bad news?”

“I don’t know, I guess it depends on how you look at it.”

“Well, don’t keep me in suspense, that counseling session really took a lot out of me,” the blonde laughed, feeling his stomach drop sickeningly in nervousness. It didn’t seem like Kaneki was upset over anything, but then again Hide didn’t know him all that well yet so maybe this was how he acted when there was something bad he wanted to tell him. Oh my god, stop over thinking! Can there really be anything worse than being stuck here against your will, Hide thought to himself as he tried to force himself to calm down. 

“Well the staff were talking, and they decided that they wanted us to be roommates,” Kaneki said, a nervous smiling playing on his lips. He continued to bite it, trying to gauge Hide’s reaction. He hadn’t had a roommate in a long time because of his issues and he didn’t know if Hide would like to sleep with all the weird nightmarish drawings Kaneki had in his room or tripping over his books. I mean they were…well kind of thing now…at least he thought they were a thing. Couples and dating actually happened quite a bit at the hospital, some made it very public, others flew under the radar. Kaneki heard of stories of staff catching a couple adolescents trying to have sex at the gym in the rec center. Most of the hook ups though ended up falling a part because of patients being discharged or due to couple fights which happened a lot. I mean there were a lot of unstable people around here.

“Roommates!? For real!?” Hide breathed out, the uneasy weight in his stomach lifting. He was beyond thrilled! He expected the staff to be extremely hesitant about placing Kaneki in the same room as someone else. Hell, he was already surprised they allowed him to stay with him when he was losing his shit. He felt his body begin to vibrate with newfound energy, his heart and breathing picking up speed. They wouldn’t have to worry about Nishiki getting disgusted at them for being lovey dovey (although Hide thought it was because he missed his girlfriend Kimi), they could talk about things more in private and be with each other during the night instead of having to go back to their rooms.

“Yeah. Since my room is one of the single bed rooms they said Nishiki could move his stuff over and I can take his spot. He seems very thrilled about being able to have his own room,” Kaneki laughed before he rubbed the back of his neck self-consciously, “So...what do you think? I mean you must’ve heard a lot of stories about me…”

“What do I think? I’m on Cloud fucking nine! This is great!” Hide grinned, his amber eyes sparkling like fireworks. He felt giddy and warm at the thought of Kaneki’s books all over the room and nuzzling his face into his pillow when he was at his own therapy sessions. He never really lived in the same space as someone else before, away from his family and Nishiki. It would be like their own little home! God, just thinking about that made Hide imagine what it would be like to share an actual house with Kaneki. He could imagine books everywhere and even on the floor. He could imagine grumbling about tripping over them in the mornings and pretending to be annoyed by it all, but secretly endearing the shit out of it because it was Kaneki. He’d gladly stub his toe on books for the rest of his days if it meant being with Kaneki, “Man who cares about the stories, I think we both made it clear we’re pretty fucked up and we both managed to handle each other at our worst.”

“You’re not scared that I might freak out and hurt you?”

“Nah man!”

“The drawings I have…the books…they’re not off putting to you? They’re not annoying?”

“Nah! They represent you and your past. They represent what you’ve been through to get to where you are today! How can I hate that? Sure, I’ll admit they are a little creepy but they depict you, your pain, your life and as your friend as someone who loves you I love every side of you. I don’t care how fucked up you get, I’ll still love you,” Hide said his voice dropping down to a whisper, his eyes staring intensely at Kaneki. When he realized just how serious and intense he got he felt his face flush intensely, “I…uhh…sorry…I mean it’s true! I-I got a little carried away though.”

Kaneki blinked, staring up at Hide with large misty eyes. No one ever told him that before…

“How do you know?”

“What?”

“How do you know you’d still love me? What if it becomes too much for you?” Kaneki asked, tears beginning to form in his eyes. Hide saw just how unconfident, how little Kaneki felt about himself reflected in those eyes. He felt his chest hurt and tears prick at his own eyes. He wondered what made Kaneki feel this way, what made Kaneki not able to see just how fucking beautiful, how compassionate, how caring of a person he really was. If he ever found that person or that thing that made him feel this way…that made him feel undesirable, worthless, disgusting, something to be feared, Hide swore he was going to absolutely obliterate them.

Hide swallowed hard, looking down at the ground and then looking around, aware that they were not the only ones alone in this building. Then he looked back at Kaneki who looked about ready to cry, taking his silence as a sign that he wasn’t as confident as he thought about how he felt for Kaneki.

“I-I can’t really predict the future,” Hide started hesitantly as he stared at the floor. He swallowed hard and turned to look up at Kaneki, his eyes hard with determination. Kaneki needed to hear this. He needed to know this, he needed to know just how Hide felt for him.

“I can’t predict the future,” Hide started again, willing his voice not to break, “But that day…when I walked into the room and saw you. It was like my world burst into color…I felt so warm…it scared the shit out of me. I never thought I’d ever feel this way about anyone or anything and I wondered if this was what it felt like to actually be alive. Like I just felt this…intense pull towards you and I didn’t even know your name. It took every ounce of will power I had to not walk towards you, I didn’t want to freak you out. It just seemed like somehow everything shitty about this world, all these shattered pieces of my life…in that moment it just felt like it all came together, everything pieced together perfectly and in that moment everything in my head was so clear. I-I can’t explain it…it just felt so…so…like something I was searching for…like I found it. I felt whole.”

Hide swallowed down a sob, his voice hoarse and tears beginning to roll down his face, “I don’t know what to expect…but after that feeling…fuck I’d rather die than be without you and I was happy that I survived that night to see you. To be with you. I want to get out of here together. I want my apartment filled with books, filled with the scent of you. Fuck I don’t care if I’m buried with them, if that’s how I go out then so be it. I love you.”

Kaneki stood, shocked and speechless as he stared at Hide who was trying so hard not to just collapse in a puddle of tears. He wondered how stupid he looked, crying about his feelings for Kaneki, like they were about to break up or something. Then a small whimper escaped his throat and when Hide looked up a hand was pressed over his mouth as his fragile body began to shake.

“Kaneki-“Hide asked, feeling bad about making the other cry but he was cut off when Kaneki pressed his lips against Hide, his hands gripping onto Hide’s jacket like a life line, desperate, like he was scared that this little piece of happiness he had left in this world would disappear. Hide kissed back just as desperately, his hands tangling into the white silky strands of Kaneki’s hair.

“Thank you,” Kaneki gasped in between kisses.

“Thank you so much-“ “Thank you for being alive.” “You’re my sunlight.” “My oxygen.”

“I love you.” “I thought I’d never be happy again.”

Hide held him closer, a hand reaching underneath to lift him up as he carried him off to his room that was soon to not be his room. He knew someone must’ve seen, but at this point in time he really didn’t give a fuck. All he had eyes for was Kaneki, all he wanted right now was Kaneki in his arms, his scent suffocating him, and to kiss him until they were both dizzy. Hide fell back on the bed, his hands rubbing circles against Kaneki’s hips, the pad of his thumb pressing against the other’s hipbone as he lightly traced the curve of it. Kaneki jumped however when one of Hide’s hands moved up under his white pajama shirt and broke away, his eyes flashing with fear.

Hide stared up at him in confusion before realization dawned on him and he pulled away instantly, “Shit sorry I should’ve asked. I got carried away.”

“It’s okay…s-sorry it’s just reflex…no one…no one touched me in so long and…” the whitette choked out, his own eyes voicing his apology.

“Don’t be. I get it,” Hide nodded with a small smile of reassurance, his eyes dilated from excitement, panting as he tried to regain the oxygen he lost while they were kissing. Hide did get it. He expected Kaneki to be a lot more gun shy when it came to touching and was happy enough when the other wanted to lay against him.

“I should be. You didn’t do anything to hurt me…” Kaneki said his gray eyes roaming down Hide’s own body, almost hungrily, but self-consciously.

“It’s instinct. It’s hard to fight instinct,” Hide coughed as he looked away, embarrassed and ashamed for letting himself get carried away like that, “I don’t even think if I’m ready for…well doing it yet and it’s not like it’s allowed…”

“W-Well I mean we don’t have to do that…but I liked the feeling of you touching me,” Kaneki admitted with a small blush, “A-And I’m curious about what you would like…I want to admire you, I’m sorry that sounds weird.”

“N-No it doesn’t!” Hide blurted out, his own face flushed scarlet, “I don’t mind…I want to see you to.”

“Okay…”

“Okay…”

The two of them stared at each other, a little uncertain on how to proceed.

“Uhm…okay…so safe word is sunflower?” Hide said, uncertainly, “If someone does something the other is uncomfortable with all we gotta do is say that word.”

“Sounds good,” Kaneki said, swallowing hard before a hand came to rest on Hide’s cheek, “Is it alright if I stripped you…?”

Hide nodded, closing his eyes when Kaneki leaned forward to continue kissing him. Kaneki began to unzip the zipper of his jacket while Hide kept his hands planted against Kaneki’s outer thighs, rubbing small circles against them. Kaneki gently pushed his jacket over his shoulders and down his arms, once it was fully off he carefully set it to the side.

“Is it okay if I…?” Hide asked, his fingers playing with the hem of his shirt in a silent request.

“Yeah…” Kaneki responded breathily as he rubbed his hands against the other’s arm, pausing momentarily at the bandage that was put on earlier, “What happened?”

“I freaked out in the shower…ended up scratching myself…sorry…” Hide sighed out, feeling guilty about it.

“It’s okay, it happens. I’m just glad you’re okay,” Kaneki said before grabbing Hide’s arms and pressing a kiss against the bandage. Hide took the silky fabric of his pajama shirt and slowly pulled it upwards. Kaneki moved his arms up to make it easier for Hide to slip his shirt off over his head, revealing the scars that riddled his body. Some were old and faded while some had shiny pink skin, still relatively fresh. There was one in particular that stood out that ran down his right side, curving around his back that looked pretty new. Some were small and precise, others looked ugly and gnarled like someone ran their claws down him.

“One day, will you tell me where you got them?” Hide asked, breaking the silence. Kaneki resisted the urge to cover himself with his hands.

“Yeah…one day. They’re ugly aren’t they?”

“Nonsense. They’re a part of you. You look like an angel…” Hide said, his voice sounding faraway and distracted as his hands reached out, wanting to touch.

“Nu-uh, not until we get your shirt off,” Kaneki laughed breathily as he gently pushed Hide’s hands away before grabbing the hem of his shirt. He gave him a pointed look, “Are you okay with it?”

Hide nodded, mostly just excited to be able to touch Kaneki’s body. He let Kaneki slip his own shirt slowly above his head, shivering a little when he felt the cold air hit his body.

“Oh, you got some to, “Kaneki gasped, his eyes taking in the scars on Hide’s chest and stomach. He had less scars, but the ones he had didn’t look like mere scratches. Most didn’t have harsh edges like Kaneki’s did. These were more precise, deliberate and purposeful. Kaneki ran his finger over his deepest one that started up near his last rib on his left side and stretched down in an arc towards his belly button. Hide shivered but leaned back to allow his lover to look at his scars.

“Is it alright if I ask where you got this from? I know it’s not really fair…”

“Yeah it’s alright I don’t mind,” Hide said watching as Kaneki traced at the others. A light one just under his collarbone, when he was still experimenting. Another shallow, short one near his ribs. Some where hidden under his forearms, these were a little deeper, “I can’t really remember the specifics, but I think I was still fucked up after Akane when that one came about. It came out to be a lot deeper than I wanted but I just wanted to feel something…or I guess I was just feeling too much and I wanted to try and bleed it out.”

“Are all of these self-inflicted?” Kaneki asked his eyes tracing over Hide’s body over and over, trying to commit it to memory. jolting a little when Hide began to trace the scars he had on his arms, there was quite a few on his hands that he didn’t notice before. Hide looked up, smiling apologetically.

“For the most part yeah. I was a huge adrenaline junkie because it was the only few things that made me feel alive when music didn’t work. Some on my legs though are not self-inflicted. Some were just from the times I tried out sports. I didn’t get any trophies from it, but I think if there was a trophy for whoever tripped themselves over then I would be the champion at it. I think the only thing I was good at was track honestly and it worked awesome for my adrenaline issues, but I had to quit because my parents were more concerned about my grades,” Hide explained, leaning over to kiss a scar on Kaneki’s chest, “See, we both have scars. It’s a part of being human.”

Hide jolted when he felt Kaneki trace over that deep scar on his stomach one again. He didn’t realize it was so sensitive.

“You okay? It doesn’t hurt does it?”

“It’s a scar…”

“Scars, even old ones can still hurt sometimes.”

“It doesn’t hurt, it’s just sensitive,” Hide reassured, playing with the hem of Kaneki’s pants.

“Can I?”

Kaneki blushed a deep scarlet, “Uhh…I don’t mind…I’m just not wearing underwear.”

“I never would’ve taken you for that type,” Hide chuckled, feeling his own face burning and heart beating hard in his chest.

“I’m not! It’s just that I didn’t feel like it today,” Kaneki mumbled as he looked away and rubbed at his warm face.

Hide laughed again breathily, his heart constricting when he saw how red Kaneki was getting he couldn’t stop himself from kissing his cheek, “You’re so cute. It just means I get to see you fully naked first, right?”

Hide swallowed hard, his heart felt like it was going to jump out of his chest. He knew they weren’t going to have sex, but he still found himself anticipating seeing all of Kaneki. All his scars. All his beauty. He slowly pulled the hem of his pants down over his hips, still giving him the chance to back out of it but Kaneki seemed more than willing to lift up his butt to help Hide pull them completely off.

Hide’s lips were parted in a silent gasp. It wasn’t like he didn’t know Kaneki had a cute ass because he totally freaking knew and have been admiring it but seeing it uncovered…

“I think your ass is gonna be one of my favorite parts of your body,” Hide blurted out, his mind running on auto pilot. Kaneki covered his mouth with a hand and laughed nervously as he remembered how Hide stated he wouldn’t have minded being mooned by Kaneki.

“Really? It’s not that great to look at…”

“Sounds fake but okay,” Hide laughed, his eyes glazed over as he leaned over to try and look at it more. He felt his dick twitch in his pants and a shaky breath escape his lips in excitement. That hadn’t happened in a long while…not since he saw that video of Brendan Urie singing and dancing butt naked in a music video.

“Hide my eyes are up here,” Kaneki laughed as he swatted him lightly on the shoulder, “Besides we still got you to take care of.”

“Oh, I am totally taken care of don’t you worry, I can stare at that masterpiece all day.”

Kaneki rolled his eyes and rubbed his hands against his face again to fight off his growing blush as he reached over to unbutton the blonde’s jean’s. His hands ghosted over the hem of his jeans, hesitant about pulling them off. Hide who reluctantly pulled his gaze away from the other’s ass gave him a reassuring smile.

“It’s okay. I trust you…”

“If you’re sure…”

“I am.”

Hide lifted his hips up, letting Kaneki shimmy the pants down over his hips along with his boxers and helping him kick them off and set them aside. Hide resisted the urge to cover himself, including the scars he had on his thighs which were mostly all deep but not as deep as the scar he gave himself the day she passed away. Hide looked away self-consciously, his hands playing with the bedsheets as he let Kaneki look at him and all the pain he hid away from people all these years. He hoped he didn’t notice that he was half hard, he didn’t want to give him the idea that he was planning on going against their promise on not fucking each other.

“Oh…” Kaneki breathed out as he saw one scar in particular that was close to groin. Kaneki’s eyes misted over and Hide wondered if the other was going to start crying again. Shit…maybe looking at all these scars wasn’t good for him, “Why did you…there?”

“I wondered if it would feel different…be more sensitive…sorry I didn’t want to upset you. Maybe this was a bad idea…”

“No…I’m glad. I’m glad that we did this. It feels…I mean it does hurt but I’m glad that you opened up to me. I’m glad that I opened up to you,” Kaneki nodded as he rubbed at his eyes that were becoming wet with tears again.

“I made you cry…”

“It’s okay. It’s not a bad thing. I love you and your scars. I don’t want you to ever feel like you have to hide anything from me…” Kaneki said as he crept closer to press his lips against Hide’s but Hide pulled away feeling ashamed. His actions hurt him…granted it was actions in the past before he even knew Kaneki, but he felt bad for inflicting this pain on himself because it hurt someone else. Why? Why did it seem like he couldn’t stop hurting people? Why couldn’t he be good enough?

“Hide what’s wrong?” Kaneki asked, his head tilted to the side, “I’m sorry. Did I push you to hard?”

Hide shook his head clenching his jaw as he tried not to cry.

“Hide…talk to me honey,” Kaneki said, his voice dropping lower.

“Sorry. I’m sorry…I hurt you by hurting myself because I’m stupid. I know I didn’t know you back then, but I still hurt you and I keep hurting people without meaning to. I’m stupid,” Hide sniffled as he rubbed at his eyes.

“Honey, no. You’re not stupid, you didn’t hurt me. I’m just glad you’re still here, my heart breaks for you, to go through all this alone, it’s really hard…you deserved better…”

“What about you? You have a lot more than I do,” Hide sobbed.

“So? It’s not a contest. I know what it’s like to be alone and to go through a lot on your own. I just can’t believe someone like you…you just always come across as being  
happy and you light up every room you walk in, yet you were going through so much by yourself…” Kaneki explained before he took his arm in his hand and rubbed the bandage there.

“If you ever feel this way again…no matter what time of day I want you to tell me. Okay? You’re not alone anymore and you don’t have to be. It’s okay to feel pain and to be angry, to be sad, to feel fear. You shouldn’t ever feel ashamed for it okay? I love you so much,” Kaneki said as he pressed his lips against Hide’s forehead.

“Okay?” Kaneki asked again.

“Okay,” Hide sighed out shakily.

“Okay…”


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I let my inner trash meme loose in this one. Pixelated cookies for those who get the references. Also for this fic I headcanon Hide to be a huge fan of JoJo's Bizarre Adventures.

The two of them stayed together like that, laying down on his bed their hands wandering over their bodies, wanting to remember the other’s body like their own. Hide’s hands roaming back to Kaneki’s ass, kneading the plump, perky skin appreciatively in his hands. When his hands weren’t appreciating that booty, it was tracing Kaneki’s face or running through those silky strands of translucent hair. He wondered how anyone’s hair could be that perfect shade of white. In between kissing, staring in each other’s eyes, they talked about life and Kaneki had opened up a little about his own past.

Kaneki had no family for the most part. His father passed away when he was around three and his mother passed away from over work at age ten. The rumors were right about how Jason abducted him, but it wasn’t until he was thirteen and he was walking home from school when it happened. If he had abducted him from his house then his aunt, cousin and uncle would all be dead, that was just how Jason was. When Hide asked if he heard any voices with his diagnosis as a schizophrenic, Kaneki responded that it was sometimes Jason’s voice, other times it was the voice of the woman that would sometimes come over. A Rize something…

Hide also found out that Kaneki’s hair had originally been black, but it changed during his stay with Jason. It was until he finally lost it, leaving Jason heavily injured, that he finally broke out and ran into some officers that took him in. It didn’t take long for the police to find out just how disturbed Kaneki was with his stay with Jason and he was sent to Anteiku. He hasn’t been out ever since. His aunt had not made any contact since then. Hide didn’t ask anything about what Jason did to him, because he figured Kaneki wasn’t ready to talk about it and if he was being honest with himself, he felt he wasn’t ready to hear it.

Once they ran out of things to talk about, they stared at each other, eyes half-lidded and fighting the urge to sleep so that they could stare at the other a little longer. Hide was losing his own fight thanks to Kaneki’s hand running through his hair. Hide was practically purring from how good it felt and he swore Kaneki was doing it on purpose so he would win this long stare down. Kaneki watched as Hide’s eyes would close for a few moments, pop back open in realization that he was falling asleep, before they returned to their lazy half open state and inevitably closed again.

“Sleep you goof,” Kaneki giggled after watching them pop open again after the fifteenth time.

“I can’t help it, you’re just so beautiful that I can’t keep myself from looking at you.”

“I’ll still be here when you wake up.”

“But then you’ll have clothes on.”

“Maybe if we ever get out of here one day, we can live in a nudist community.”

“Mmm sounds nice…” Hide said, his voice husky with sleep. Kaneki’s hand roamed down to his back where he lightly began to run his fingernails up and down Hide’s back. Hide moaned, feeling goosebumps rise up on his skin in pleasure before he breathily laughed, “You’re doing this on purpose so you can win aren’t you?”

“I wasn’t aware we were having a contest, but yes I am and those moans you’re making are delicious.”

“Keep it in your pants Kaneki.”

“I think we’re a little too late for that Hide.”

Hide hummed, his eyes closing as he finally gave in to sleep. One hand rested on Kaneki’s hip while the other threaded itself with the hand that wasn’t stroking his back. Before he fell into unconsciousness he felt a pair of lips connect with his forehead and a soft whisper of good night.

~

“Alright, where do you want these?” Hide called out, resting his chin on the stack of books he was hauling to his room. Kaneki whipped his head around, his arms raised as he taped up the last of his drawings around the room. After a lot of convincing on his part, he managed to get Kaneki to wear one of his band t-shirts which was a black tee that had the Monsters of Men icon and his black skinny jeans.

“Uhm…how about on the desk over there, next to the others?”

“You know we could always just share a closet. I know it’s not a lot of space, but we can turn the other one into a mini book shelf of some sort,” Hide suggested as he set the books carefully on the desk before slowly turning around in the room, a pleased smile on his face.

“Are you sure? I don’t want to take up too much space.”

“Kaneki, you already take up most of the space in my heart, it can’t get any worse, believe me. I will gladly drown in you and your majestic ass.” Hide said, admiring how his skinny jeans looked on Kaneki’s hips.

“Hide I think we need to have an intervention about your fixation with my butt.” Kaneki laughed as he grabbed some of his books and began to put them away in his closet. He made sure to shake his hips a little more than necessary when he walked, just for Hide who sat on the bed on his side of the room and took in the view with half-lidded eyes.

“Maybe if you’d stop enabling me it wouldn’t be that hard,” Hide smirked, managing to tear his gaze away from Kaneki’s butt in favor of looking around their room. His eyes roved over the nightmarish images that plagued his love over the past several years. There was a centipede crawling out of someone’s ear in one, another one showed someone’s face that was cracked like someone threw a punch against a mirror. That was one of his favorites.

“Hey Hide…I’ve been meaning to ask you this but I think you should try drawing. Uta is a counselor who dabbles in art therapy. He introduced me into doing it. I’m not really good at drawing fun, happy things…maybe you can give our new living space some positivity,” Kaneki said, offering a sketchbook to Hide and a pencil with a small, self-conscious blush on his cheeks.

“Are you sure? I really suck at drawing Kaneki. A three-year-old can draw better than I can.”

“I’m sure you’re not that bad, besides it would be good for you. It’s therapeutic! Here I’ll draw with you!” Kaneki said as he opened up his sketchbook and tore out a page before shoving the book into Hide’s hands and wandering off to find a book he could use as a hard surface to draw on.

“Fine, but don’t complain to me if your eyes start bleeding at the mere sight of the shit show that will be my drawing,” Hide rolled his eyes, before flipping through the sketchbook and looking at the sketches that were half done while he searched for a blank sheet. He landed on the drawing of him that Kaneki was sketching while he waited for Hide to wake up from his magical fun time of trying an anti-depressant for the first time. It looked almost as real as a photograph to him. Almost because Hide had a hard time believing this was him. The hair tipped him off…and the sunflower that was weaved into his hair. That, he was sure was an add on from Kaneki. But where was the drool? His hair sticking up in all places? Here it was messy, but in an attractive sort of way, it was sexier. Instead of drool dribbling out the side of his mouth, there was soft lips opened slightly, and holy shit did he really have that many eyelashes!? A soft shadow was casted over one side of his face, as if the early morning sun was pouring in from a nearby window.

“Do you like it? I know it isn’t the best…and I didn’t know what flower you liked but a sunflower seemed to fit you well,” Kaneki said, staring down at his sketchbook and breaking Hide from his thoughts.

“Uhh…it’s like…really really good. I mean I think you’d have made it more authentic if you drew the drool and other messy features. Like no way in hell do I look that awesome,” Hide responded honestly, a small blush on his cheeks.

“It is authentic. That’s how you looked when you were sleeping. The sunflower of course was not there. The sunlight pouring in wasn’t exactly there either, but everything else was.” Kaneki said as he walked around to sit on the other bed to the side of Hide so he’d have a good view to sketch out Hide’s entire body. Kaneki made himself comfortable, his eyes scanning over Hide for a minute before he pressed his pencil to his paper and soft scratching sounds filled the room. 

Hide mimicked Kaneki, feeling a soft blush rise to his cheeks when the other stared at him silently, his eyes raking over and studying every feature of his body. Since he didn’t have a clue on what he wanted to draw, he decided he’d take Kaneki’s route and attempt to draw his lover. After all, he had already drawn him, maybe he should return the favor. Hide tried to focus on Kaneki’s body, but he felt anxietal about his drawing skills. There’s no way he’d be able to draw Kaneki well enough to express the amount of beauty he possessed. As he pressed his own pencil down to his own blank sheet of paper, he found he couldn’t move his hand. He was afraid of failing, afraid of Kaneki laughing at him.  
“Hide, don’t overthink it. Just draw whatever comes to mind,” Kaneki’s soft voice floated up to stomp out the self-doubt that was creeping into the recesses of his mind. Kaneki may have not looked up from his paper, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t aware of Hide’s lack of movement, “Art isn’t just about professional drawings of landscapes or people. It can be messy and confusing. Like life. It can be scribbles if you wanted it to be. Art is used to express feelings, and anyone can create it. The artist has the freedom to make whatever they want to make, to break out of the structured world we live in.”

“You won’t laugh?”

“I won’t laugh.”

“Kay…” Hide sighed as he relaxed and let his hand move on its’ own. He started by roughly sketching the back of Kaneki’s head by memory, deciding that staring at him would only distract him and cause him to feel doubtful of himself again. Then he did a rough sketch of Kaneki’s neck, shoulders, arms, and waist. He decided he would stop at the waist, because there was no way he’d be able to draw the perfection that was Kaneki’s ass. There was no way he’d be able to try and draw it from reference either, because he’d probably die from the massive nosebleed he would be having.

“Hey Kaneki, do you have colored pencils by any chance?”

Kaneki made a small humming noise as he looked up from his drawing, a habit Hide realized he did whenever someone pulled him out of something he was doing. He found it to   
be endearing the way Kaneki would blink a few times as his mind returned back to reality.

“Colored pencils? Yeah, I think so…I don’t have a sharpener though so if you need them sharpened you’ll have to ask one of the staff to do it for you,” he replied, walking over to his closet to grab his set of colored pencils before walking over to Hide to give it to him. He leaned over in an attempt to get a good look at his drawing but Hide quickly pressed the sketchbook against his chest to hide it.

“Hey, no peeking, it’s not finished yet,” Hide smirked.

Kaneki pouted, his gray eyes wide and innocent. Oh, shit, that’s adorable, Hide thought to himself. When they got out of here he swore he was going to spoil this man rotten. All he needed was to make that face and Hide would gladly buy a cart full of books for him. He’d walk to the ends of the earth for him. Anything Kaneki asked of Hide, he would do anything in his power to get for him. All he needed to do was to make that face.

“I wasn’t trying to peek, I just lost my balance.”

“Sure, you did, now go sit down. It’ll be done soon I promise,” Hide chuckled.

“Alright, alright. It’ll be great! We’ll have to hang it up after your done,” Kaneki said excitedly.

“You sound like such a mom saying that.”

“Well, I just like the idea of seeing your drawings up next to mine…” Kaneki said defensively with a soft blush, as he walked back over to continue his drawing, “I’m sure they’ll brighten up the room a lot more…it’ll be a symbol of transition.”

“Well, if that’s the case, I’ll try and make them as bright and stupid as possible so that you’ll still be able to laugh, even on your darkest days!”

“I look forward to it,” Kaneki said with a soft smile, his gray eyes shining.

~

By the end of the day the two of them had added six new drawings to their room. Four of them came from Hide, two of them were dorky ones, while the other two he put more effort in. One of them was a stick figure with huge butt cheeks and beside the stick figure in block letters it read “Does he have da booty? He doooo!” For his other funny drawing he drew a bunch of sunflowers with funny faces, one of them looked high, one had the henohenomoheji face on it, another had some smug pepe the frog looking face on it, while another had the yaranaika face. His personal favorite was the sunflower that looked like it had Dio’s face on it from JoJo’s Bizarre Adventures and he even added a quote “You thought I was an ordinary sunflower, but it is I Dio!”

For his first serious one it was Kaneki facing away from the viewer. He was left uncolored, pure white with colors spreading outwards from him. Hide tried to use every single colored pencil he had to show the amount of colors exuding from Kaneki. He knew it wasn’t all the colors that the world had to offer, but he tried to show just how much color Kaneki has brought into his life. The first time Kaneki looked at it, Hide heard the soft gasp that escaped between his lips and he thought for a moment he hated it. Then he looked up to find Kaneki’s eyes leaking, thankfully not blood like he warned originally, but it was of tears. Kaneki made it a huge deal to stick it up on the ceiling above them so that he could lay down and always look at it. Hide’s second serious one was one of the inside of a house. There was a couch in the middle with two small tables on either side. In front of the couch was a coffee table. Soft light was filtering in towards the couch, like a fireplace had been lit in front of it. One of the tables had a lamp with books stacked on it. The left-hand table had a vase with a sunflower and a white carnation with still more books waiting to be read. In the back, there was a window with curtains drawn and to the sides of the window were bookshelves filled to the brim with books. There were still even more books stacked on top of the bookshelves. On the coffee table there were two mugs, one was a light blue with Kaneki scrawled on it. The other was a yellow mug with Hide scrawled on it. Orange headphones were also laid on the coffee table with Hide’s beloved phone connected to them. Kaneki also adored this one.

For Kaneki’s first drawing, he used the colored pencils and drew Hide curled up on the bed, his face smoothed over and amber eyes looking off into the distance. Instead of holding the sketchbook against his legs like he had been earlier, Kaneki drew his phone in his hand and headphones on his head. His amber eyes looked shiny, full of life. Instead of the white walls of their psych ward room, the walls were soft blue. Kaneki’s second drawing was split in half with two people in their separate halves. The first half held a man with white hair, faceless, surrounded by stars that shone brightly, but coldly. He wore all white with gray, shaded circles decorating his clothes here and there, like he was the personification of the moon. The man was looking up at the other figure in the other half, head tilted in confusion, but reaching out towards the other half. The man in the other half was mostly faceless except for a soft smile gracing his lips. He wore all yellow with what looked to be sparks or flames coming from his clothes, sunflowers surrounding him instead of stars. He held out his hand towards the man in white.

Once they hung up their six drawings, the two of them laid down on Hide’s bed (deeming it to be the comfiest of the two in the room) to admire their works. Kaneki lazily pet Hide’s hair as they stared up at their ceiling, while Hide played with Kaneki’s foot by bumping his own against his. Even though he really wanted to hold his hand or run his hand up his shirt, he thought it would feel super awkward in their position.

“Hey Hide…”

“Yeah…”

“If we ever get out of this place…what would we do? Like I know we’ll get a house and live together…but what would we do?”

Hide opened his mouth in response but found he actually didn’t know what they would do. He never had anyone to do the things he wanted to do with. Akane mostly led the way while she was alive, and after high school his group of friends disbanded. He usually did what they did, which was usually something questionable at their age. When left to his own devices it was usually listening to music, throwing himself into his studies or doing something involving self-harm or being stupid.

“I don’t really know,” Hide admitted with a sigh, “I was usually by myself and if I did hang out with people I didn’t have a choice in what we did. I think I’d like to do something that was pretty chill though…”

“Well…what did you want to do? What do you think would be fun?”

“Like going to the beach together or taking a road trip somewhere and go camping. Go hiking. Enjoy life. We could go on book store dates or try to seek out the best coffee shop in the city. We could try and take up a hobby together. Maybe try out roller blading and fall flat on our faces, but we’d still have fun because we would be tripping over ourselves together. When we’re all bruised and tired at the end of the day, we’d go home and cuddle over warm drinks. We could grow a garden! I don’t know…is it strange that I want to do anything and everything as long as it’s with you?”

“I don’t think it’s strange…unless you also include hiding a dead body together,” Kaneki said as he glanced over at Hide with a smirk his eyes shining with humor.

“I don’t know about you, but I would love to hide a dead body with you. Then climb in the shower with you and help you wash all the blood from your body,” Hide responded with his own grin.

“Oh my god Hide,” Kaneki snorted as he turned over to bury his face into one of the pillows to muffle out his laughter.

“Kaneki control yourself, that’s the kind of talk you have to save for the bedroom.”

“Hide!”

“Well I’m sorry Kaneki, but I believe all the best couples have to hide a dead body together. You know the more you keep shouting my name, the more people will be suspicious we’re playing black hole assault.”

Kaneki groaned out in disgust and continued to bury his face in the pillow.

“That sounded sexy,” Hide said with an eyebrow wiggle as rolled over, so he could wrap his arm around Kaneki’s waist, “I gotta say seeing you in one of my shirts is also pretty sexy.”

Kaneki sighed in defeat.

“I love you…”

Kaneki gave a muffled response, his hand reaching up a bit harshly to find Hide’s head that he accidentally whapped him in the face. “Gah! Kaneki! So violent! Even after I declared my love to you!” Hide complained but quickly relaxed when Kaneki’s hand scratched his head gently in apology.

After a few moments of silence Hide responded,” You’re lucky I’m a masochist-“

WHACK!

“Hideyoshi Nagachika, stop being so dirty!” Kaneki responded as he raised his face up and away from the pillow to fix Hide with a glare, his face a dark shade of red.

“Mmm more Kaneki,” Hide moaned in a high-pitched voice, cackling when Kaneki’s eyes widened, and his face flushed an impossibly deeper shade of red.

Then Kaneki’s eyes narrowed dangerously, his gray eyes flashing like a predator whose found his prey. Hide continued to cackle for a few more moments, but it quickly died down when he saw the way Kaneki was looking at him.

“Fine, if you want to play it that way…” the whitette purred as he climbed on top of Hide. In a deep voice, he leaned over to Hide to whisper in his ear with a funny, unnaturally deep voice, “Safe word is deeper.”

After that Kaneki sat back on his haunches to admire the effect it had on Hide. He raised an eyebrow up at Hide who squeaked girlishly and began to wheeze because he was laughing too hard. Kaneki smirked victoriously and leaned down again, trying hard to keep his composure as he continued in his deep voice, “Bite the pillow Pinocchio, I’m going in dry.”

Hide squealed, tears beginning to collect in his eyes as his face began to turn dark red. Kaneki leaned back, moving off of him slightly so he wasn’t crushing him under his weight as he thought up another one. With another smirk he leaned down again, losing his composure slightly because Hide’s laughter was contagious as he said, “Baby there are about to be seven planets, because I’m going to destroy Uranus.”

“Oh my god Kaneki stop!” Hide squealed as he fanned his hands in front of his face, he was straight up crying at this point, “Where are you getting these!? I thought you were innocent!?”

“Hide you’re in a psych ward, nobody here is innocent!” Kaneki laughed, leaning his head against Hide’s chest.

“Remind me to mess with you more often, that was awesome! Just don’t speak like that during sex otherwise that’ll be a huge turn off,” Hide chuckled.

“As long as you promise not to moan like a cat who got their tail slammed into a door.”

“Deal,” Hide breathed out, on the verge of another wheezing fit at the comparison.

“Oh my god Hide breathe!”

“How can I when such a cutie like you goes from ‘Hello it’s nice to meet you sir’ to ‘Your daughter calls me daddy to?’ that’s true talent!”

“Well I was the lead role of a play before…even though I didn’t want to do it…”

“Really? Damn…”

“So, I noticed you mentioned sex…are you actually open to doing that with me? Aren’t you nervous? I mean you have been…before-”

“Well yeah. I am a little nervous, but I trust you. I trust that you won’t hurt me or take advantage of me like that. I’m just sad that I’m technically not a virgin anymore. I always thought my first time would be special.”

“I would say you’re still a virgin. You didn’t want to have sex. She took that away from you. Even if you don’t believe that, we’d still have our first time and it can still be special. I think what makes a first time the first time is the fact that both parties consent.”

“So, what about you? Are you a virgin?”

Kaneki paused a long time on that question, his face growing troubled.

“Sorry, you don’t have to answer that-“

“No, it’s fine. It’s fine trust me. The answer is…no. No, I’m not a virgin, at least by your standards. I have Jason to thank for that. I guess one could call me very experienced as well because of him. However, over the years of trying to accept what he did to me, I started to believe that he didn’t take my virginity away from me. I mean, virginity is abstract. If somebody rapes you, that to me isn’t sex. That’s a crime. Someone is taking advantage of someone else. Sex is two consenting adults, so technically I never had sex, therefore I’m still a virgin. That’s at least how I think about it.”

Hide felt his jaw clench in anger, his mind couldn’t even conjure up the sick shit that Jason had done to Kaneki. He had a few inklings, but he doubted his own imaginings could come close to the putridness that was Jason.

“I can’t even imagine the things that he must’ve done to you…”

“A lot of the staff members couldn’t either…but that’s not the point. It’s over now. It doesn’t bother me anymore,” Kaneki said, touching his chin, “One day I’ll talk about it more, but I think we should get some rest. You have online college stuff to do and I have to talk to Uta tomorrow. Do you mind if I show him some of your drawings?”

“Not at all. He’s the art therapist guy here right?”

“Yeah. You might like him. I wonder if they would let me take you to him sometime.”

“Honestly, I think they’re willing to throw me into anything that could help me get better, so it shouldn’t be too hard,” Hide said, deciding he wouldn’t push it but he knew what   
Jason did to him still bothered him a lot more than he let on. He was a little excited about the idea of meeting this Uta guy, well really, he was interested in anyone that has been close to Kaneki over the years.

“If you say so, but I should warn you. He’s a little strange.”

“Kaneki, look at me, do I look like any ordinary guy you would meet on the street?”

“With that fashion sense? I have to say no.”

“Okay….ow Kaneki.”

Kaneki chuckled and gave Hide a kiss on the nose, “I’m just joking. I love you.”

“I love you to…”


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know this chapter is hella short compared to my other chapters...but I promise the next few are longer. I have a reason as to why I cut this one off so short. Next two will be posted tomorrow (life is calling for me and I must answer it lol)

“Ah so this is the blonde bombshell you were talking about,” the man with black sclera’s and red irises said, his eyes blinking owlishly as he focused his attention on Hide who smiled politely. He didn’t expect to meet him so soon, but Kaneki insisted that he had to meet Uta as soon as possible. That being said, after he was finished with his online classes today and his first group session which held nothing of value, Kaneki took him by the hand and dragged him to Uta’s office. Of course, they had to be escorted by a staff member.

Uta sat on his chair backwards, his hands resting on the back of it which Hide could see were decorated in tattoos, like his neck, his chest, and part of his arm that showed out of his black jacket that looked about ready to fall off. The guy had a lip piercing, eyebrow piercing, and god only knows how many on his ears. Hide was positive he must have a dick piercing to. One side of his head was shaved while the other side had hair reaching down to his neck. In the back his black hair was spiked up. Okay, Kaneki was right about the strange part, but Hide didn’t find himself put off by how the guy looked. In fact, Uta looked kind of sexually attractive.

“So, you wear contacts?” Hide asked, referring to the strange color of his eyes.

“No, they’re tattooed.”

Yep he definitely has a dick piercing, Hide thought to himself.

“Damn…”

Kaneki laughed.

“You are very bright, you have a lot of strange colors about you, but they seem to fit pleasantly well,” Uta observed. Hide took it as a compliment.

“Thanks. You have a lot of black, not that that’s a bad thing.”

“He’s referring to your aura,” Kaneki supplied with a small smile.

“Oh, you have special eyes to. My parents tell me I have a special kind of stupid,” the blonde blurted out, finding himself strangely comforted, even when they were in such a strange room. Masks hung on the wall and where there wasn’t masks there were sketches of masks. One mask looked like a half moon with red lips and a creepy diamond like smile. It had a circle with a slash through it and as Hide continued to study it he saw that it was supposed to be an eye. Another mask had an eye patch connected to it while the bottom half of the mask had red bloody gums with white teeth stretched into a grotesque smile. One look like a black dog’s face, although it looked more like the Egyptian god Anubis’s face to Hide. Other masks depicted demons, clowns, skulls or rabbits which reminded Hide of Akane. One mask had a sharp peak to it and big round eyes, the eyes looked like they were goggles. It reminded Hide of a gas mask of some sort.

“I believe the word you are looking for is courage. Most people mistake it for being stupid,” Uta supplied, noticing the blonde look around the room at his masks.

“If you don’t mind me asking, just how did you get a job here? You don’t exactly scream counselor or therapist, and I mean that as a compliment. Have you seen Marude’s office?   
It’s sooo boring,” Hide said as he crisscrossed his legs on the chair he was sitting on, his hands on his knees.

“Oh, I know, it took quite a lot of convincing, but once they saw me in action they were excited to hire me. I believe the stereotypical counselor with the fake smiles and ‘how does   
that make you feel’ talk doesn’t help anyone. It’s too robotic and it doesn’t feel genuine. So, I decided to show myself as genuine as possible. People who are patients here already feel like they’re weird and insane, so I decided to show myself and all my quirkiness, so they didn’t have to feel alone. I work to empower people and their unique qualities,” Uta explained.

“And the masks?”

“We need to have a mask we never take off,” the man said, “While it is good to express pent up emotions and to talk through our problems, I believe there is always a side of us that we keep hidden from our closest friends or family. Even to our counselors. They try so hard to widdle away at everyone’s walls, but this is a place where I don’t do that. All I ask my patients to do is to draw out their feelings. Art is a therapy where you can get out what you have to get out, but you can also hide behind your mask because people interpret an artist’s work through many different perspectives. My patients don’t have to tell me what their drawings mean if they don’t want to and they can do whatever they want to it after they’re done creating it. I try not to pry too deep. I try to give them an escape from having their brain being picked at from everyone else.”

“That sounds amazing…”

“All the masks hung up are masks I made to represent the patients I have encountered or the co-workers I am particularly fond of. The half-moon is Shuu Tsukiyama’s. The rabbit is Touka Kirishima’s. The dog is Irimi’s. The bird-like mask over there is Yomo’s, he’s my favorite,” Uta continued, listed off the masks and who they belonged to.

“And the eye patch one?”

“That one is Kaneki’s.”

“It looks hot,” Hide blurted out and earned a soft punch from Kaneki.

“I’m glad you think so,” Uta said, clasping his hands together cheerfully, “So now that we got introductions out of the way, is there any new drawings you want me to look at?”

“Yeah actually, the two of us came up with four of them,” Kaneki piped up as he offered his sketchbook that he had kept clutched to his chest to Uta. The rest of their visit was mostly centered on Kaneki, which was fine with Hide because he kept his mind busy admiring Uta’s art work and hearing what he had to say about each of their drawings. He didn’t make fun of Hide’s artwork, even though Hide personally thought it sucked. The man was serious, thoughtful, and nonjudgmental. He paused particularly longer on the drawing Hide drew of inside a room in a house, a soft, curious smile gracing his lips. He kept his thoughts to himself, but Kaneki knew that there was a different light in Uta’s eyes when he handed the drawings back to him.

Over the years that he and Kaneki talked he was familiar with his dark, macabre drawings. While he encouraged him to continue to express his feelings, he felt his patient was stuck in an endless spiral of pain and misery. It was only two weeks ago that he noticed his drawings began to change and he felt excited that Kaneki was finding his way out of the vicious cycle he was in. Though he wondered what provoked such a change, he didn’t push him, not until he showed his sketch of Hide sleeping. Now he actually got to meet the one responsible for the change. There was a lot of yellow exuding from Hide which was almost blinding with some orange but there was also some dark blue and green. While the man expressed a lot of positive colors, he had negative colors mixed closer to his body. He was broken, but he tried hard not to show it. Uta wondered how much of that yellow was a façade and how much was real.

“Well, it was a pleasure to finally meet you Hide, don’t be afraid to grace me with your presence again, you truly have a beautiful arrangement of colors,” Uta said when they were finally nearing the end of the session.

“Yeah, it was awesome to meet you to. I never met someone who made masks before or got their eyes tattooed. I didn’t even know that was a thing,” the blonde chirped, feeling refreshed for once after a session.

“Bye Uta, see you next time,” Kaneki also chirped, he looked extremely pleased at their interaction. As they walked back to the unit Kaneki weaved his hand within Hide’s and was humming softly to himself, his eyes held child-like glee. Hide grinned, deciding to hum along and swing their arms up and down dramatically which made Kaneki laugh.

“I think your going to be the next mask he makes. He really liked you.”

“Really? I’m sure there are a lot more interesting people than me.”

“Maybe, but usually he doesn’t talk so fondly of someone else’s aura.”

“I wonder if my mask is going to be a sunflower…”

“That honestly wouldn’t be surprising.”

When the staff opened the door, they were surprised to meet Irimi at the door with a soft smile.

“Ah, Mr. Nagachika, we were waiting for you. You have visitors.”

Wait. What visitors? Hide looked over at Kaneki who shrugged in response before giving Irimi his attention once again.

“Visitors? Who-?” Hide choked out but trailed off when he saw a man with dark, graying brunette hair and stubble on his face. He had glasses on and frown lines, his brown eyes   
stern, judging and hard, he was looking right at Hide. It was the face that Hide dreaded seeing every day, that let him know that he did something wrong, that he was always wrong. There was a woman next to him who had soft brown eyes, but also calculating. Her brown hair was short, totally the ‘can I see your manager’ cut. Her brown eyes widened when she looked down at their hands connected.

“Your parents.”


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm thinking of writing a thing about instances of Hide's past more in depth. Like his memories dealing with his parents. What do you guy think?

“Your parents.”

Hide felt his heart drop into his stomach and prayed that they weren’t here to make a scene. He knew they were looking at him, he knew they were judging him for holding another man’s hand. He knew they were judging Kaneki and his sickly appearance. He knew they were judging him for landing himself in here. He knew they were homophobic. He just prayed that they wouldn’t hurt Kaneki.

Kaneki looked up at Hide at the word parents and loosened his hand against Hide, ready to pull away. He thought he wanted alone time with his parents, but Hide squeezed his hand, begging him to stay.

“Well…let me take you guys to the family room. Kaneki you should probably go to your room-“

“Nah he can stay. It’s fine,” Hide said a little too quickly, but he tried to cover it up with a blinding smile. His father frowned at this, as Hide willed his feet to move, following the staff member to a little room that had a tiny book shelf, a T.V. and some chairs. Kaneki squeezed his hand back, his gaze questioning wondering what he should do, or what he could do to help Hide. When they got to the room, Hide nudged Kaneki to sit on the far end of the couch, as far away from his parents as he could get him. He sat next to him, but his body was faced towards his parents as if he was protecting Kaneki from them. His parents took the two chairs next to the couch. When the door closed behind Irimi, they sat in silence for a few moments before his father began.

“I see you’ve gotten yourself a friend while living here off of other people’s taxes for the past two weeks and draining our bank account,” his father started, his eyes narrowing at Kaneki judgmentally. He spat out ‘friend’ like it was something foul. Kaneki responded with a soft smile.

“Your son has been a delight. He’s so sweet and he’s been such a great help with getting me out of my shell,” Kaneki blurted out which only made Hide clutch his hand tighter, when he saw his father’s eyes glint with more displeasure. He knew Kaneki was only trying to make him feel better, he was trying to help, but his father wouldn’t see it as that way. He would never see Hide in that kind of light.

“Yes, well, there’s a lot more to him than meets the eye, but I suppose that you can’t tell the difference between a delinquent and a respectable man. I’ve heard you’ve been here for quite some time,” his father responded snidely back as he stared down at their hands. Hide resisted the urge retaliate against what he said. Instead, he swallowed down the words threatening to bubble up as he shifted his attention to his mother who seemed she was going to be sick at the sight that they were still holding hands.

“Oh yeah. You guys haven’t met. Mom. Dad. This is Kaneki. Kaneki these are my parents,” Hide responded cheerfully, although Kaneki knew it was all just a façade. If he looked close enough he could see how tense Hide’s jaw was when he smiled and how his voice was at a higher pitch, then it usually was when he was cheerful. His parents didn’t respond.

“Your father and I came here to tell you that we put up your apartment for rent and placed your things in a storage unit. It was becoming difficult to pay for your hospital bills,” his mother said coldly. Hide resisted the urge to grind his his teeth at that. What the fuck, really!? Like hell you couldn’t pay the bills! You’re a doctor and a lawyer! I worked my ass off to pay for that apartment with zero help from you and now you’re telling me I won’t have anywhere to live when we get out of here!? Kaneki kept his mouth shut, but kept his eyes trained on Hide who continued to smile.

“We’ve also seen that your grades have been slipping again…”

How!? He was in college, they weren’t allowed to give out his grades to his parents, it was illegal! He paid his way through college by himself, they had no right to see his grades! If they were slipping it was only because he was stuck here! He couldn’t help it!

“Ah…well I’ve been going through some rough patches-“

“That’s no excuse, you are a Nagachika, you should be acting like one! You shouldn’t be sitting here holding onto another man’s hand sitting on your ass and doing nothing!” His father piped up.

“I can hold onto his hand if I want to. It doesn’t matter if he’s a guy or a girl. I love him.” Hide responded back, his voice rising. Now he was passing the point of no return.  
His mother gasped at that, her eyes narrowing in disgust, “Hideyoshi Nagachika, you have no idea what you’re saying! Once you get out of here you’ll realize that-“

“Fat chance, look at him, he’s always been a fuck up. Do you know how much your mother and I went through over the past two weeks because you thought it would be funny to take a bunch of sleeping pills. Do you know what kind of shit your classmate went through because of your stunt!? All the rumors, how much money it’s costing. You don’t think of anyone but yourself!” his father interrupted, his face turning red in anger.

Hide forced himself to breathe normally, even though his body was vibrating with anger. He was sure Kaneki could see how hard his hand was beginning to shake. The blonde turned away from his parents and leaned down towards Kaneki’s ear, “I think you should leave. Things are starting to get ugly.”

Kaneki gave him a look that said, ‘Are you sure?’ and Hide nodded quickly. He didn’t want Kaneki to see anymore of this and he definitely didn’t want him to sit here and hear   
what his parents thought about him. This had nothing to do with him. This was about Hide and he was going to make sure it stayed like that. Kaneki looked at him uncertainly as he looked from his parents, then back to him, trying to gauge the situation. After giving him pleading look, Kaneki finally got up to leave, but it was slow and reluctant. As much as Hide wanted him to stay, to give him the strength to keep his façade up (even though it was crumbling away at a fast pace) he knew it wasn’t fair for Kaneki to sit here and watch. He didn’t know if this would trigger him. As he heard the door close softly behind him, Hide fixed his gaze on his parents. He dropped the happy façade in favor of staring at them, his face blank but eyes glowing with rage. It was just like old times, when he finally got sick of their crap and actually tried to defend himself.

“Seriously? Him? You picked a scrawny, sickly looking kid to fuck with? Wasn’t that girl in high school enough for you?” his father bit in.

“His name is Kaneki and I would prefer to keep him out of this. He is of no concern to you. As for that girl, her name is Akane and I didn’t do anything to her,” Hide calmly replied.

“Have you…. have you done it with him?” his mother questioned

“No, I haven’t.”

“Then what’s the point? You’re just lonely. There’s a perfectly fine, little lady out there that I’m sure you’ll get along great with-“

“What’s the point!? The point is Kaneki is beautiful and he gets me, and I want to protect him and love him. What’s not to get!? Why the hell is this so hard for you to understand! I don’t like girls! I never did!”

“Don’t you talk to your mother that way!”

“You’re just confused,” his mother said, her voice choking up as if she was about to cry.

“I’m not confused!” Hide said, raising his voice.

“First the man at the tram station, then your grades, then you always coming always below first place in track, then being out past curfew, then smelling the alcohol on your breath, then hearing of that poor girl you sent falling out of the roof top of the school, then hearing you overdosed on sleeping pills, what the hell is next Hideyoshi!? Don’t you think we’ve suffered enough as your parents!?”

“Don’t you think I suffered enough as your son!? I didn’t cause Akane’s death, I worked my ass off in my classes, even though most times I was trying to fight to stay awake! I worked my ass off at track. It wasn’t my fault I wasn’t the fastest on the team! I worked my ass off getting into college and paying my way! I worked my ass off paying for that apartment you guys fucking put up for rent! I’m tired of not being enough for you! I have someone who thinks I’m enough for them and you guys already had to fucking insult him when you barely even know him! When are you going to fucking satisfied!? I wasn’t being stupid! I overdosed on pills because I was actually trying to fucking kill myself! It didn’t matter what the fuck I did, you two still wouldn’t be proud of me. I got fucking sick of living that way, so I wanted to die. You sucked the life out of me, you made me hate school, you made me hate track, you made me hate life, you made me hate myself, you made me hate my family name! Don’t you dare talk about your suffering, when you didn’t even bother to ask me how I felt all those years trying to please you! You don’t know suffering! All you cared about was your reputation, you never gave a shit about me! If you only came here to remind me of what a fucking disappointment I am, then it fucking worked! I wish I died that day, I wish my fucking classmate wasn’t there to call the paramedics-“Hide screamed in hysteria, letting the words that boiled inside him all those years for his parents, to finally erupt. He didn’t care who heard or if it was going to spread around town or the hospital or wherever the fuck it went.

Hide opened his mouth to continue, but a sharp slap resounded in the room and the next thing he knew he was on the floor, his butt hitting the floor with a loud thud. There was the sound of books falling to the floor when his elbow hit against the bookshelf.

“You little piece of shit,” his father growled, as he grabbed Hide’s shirt collar and hauled him up only to slam him against the wall. He wrenched his arm back, his hand forming a fist before he hit Hide squarely in the face, hard enough that Hide’s head snapped painfully to the side and he saw stars. He heard the door slam open as a staff member ran in when they heard the commotion. It was Irimi.

“I’m sorry, but you and your wife are going to have to leave. You can’t be doing this here,” Irimi said, grabbing his father’s shoulder, her voice stern, but her grasp said that she wasn’t afraid to use force.

“Bull shit! This is my son! I will discipline him how I see fit and no one is going to get in the way of that!” His father shouted as he sent another punch into Hide’s stomach before throwing him out the door, where he reeled his arm back again ready to punch Hide when he was barely on his feet. Hide looked up and even though he knew he could fight back, he couldn’t find it in himself to do so. He knew it would make his time in here much worse if he did so he decided he would just take the abuse like he always did. He looked up, bracing himself for the next punch, but then there was a flash of white and the sound of his hand hitting squarely against someone else’s hand. Hide opened his eyes wide. It was Kaneki and his eyes were narrowed and deadly. Irimi was calling on the radio for back up, apparently being only one of the few that was working today.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing you faggot!” his father spat at Kaneki who had his fist firmly in his hand. Nishiki took this opportunity to run over to Hide’s side to provide back-up in case Kaneki couldn’t handle him on his own. Touka, who usually stayed in the background ran over to dart behind Hide’s dad, ready to restrain him from behind if he tried to advance further.

“I could ask you the same thing,” Kaneki said, but his voice sounded different, a lot more scary and cold, commanding attention, “Do you remember where you are? Some of us have been abused by our parents in the past. Do you understand how many people you may have triggered by your display?”

“I am not abusing him! I am disciplining him, and some sick kid isn’t going to tell me what to do.”

“You’ve wounded something that is very precious to me,” Kaneki growled out, his eyes narrowing into slits, “I refuse to believe that a father, someone who was supposed to be there to protect and support his children in whatever they do, would hurt his son in such a way even after he had tried to take his own life. You make me sick. You are no father.   
And you-”

Kaneki turned to Hide’s mother who stood there, watching the display submissively. Her body tensed up with fear with how intensely Kaneki was staring at her, “You’re no mother. No mother would allow her husband to hurt her son like this. No mother would sit back and watch her husband beat up her child after he spilled his guts to you. A mother would be understanding and loving.”

‘Like my mom…?’ Kaneki asked himself.

“I wish he would’ve died because the sight of him makes me sick. He is no son of mine. He is no Nagachika and I wish it was him who fell off the roof top instead of that poor little girl that had so much to live for,” his father growled out and Hide felt his stomach drop sickeningly. He looked around, apparently everyone on the unit heard and Hide lowered his head in shame. He was used to living with trying to live up to the Nagachika name and it was hard to break out of that habit. Nishiki who lowered himself next to Hide, his arms twitching and ready to tear his dad a new one if he inched closer, muttered under his breath, “What the fuck…is this guy serious?”

“You’re the one to talk, the sight of you makes me want to puke,” Touka growled.

Two more staff members finally arrived on the scene, one of them being Yomo who was pulled onto a different unit today. He wasted no time walking over to grab Hide’s father roughly by the shoulder and push him away from Kaneki and up against the wall.

“You need to leave, right now,” Yomo said, sternly, “If you do not leave willingly, I will drag you off these grounds myself. You are not allowed to visit your son Hide anymore at this hospital. Do I make myself clear? You have disrupted the peace on our unit and I will make sure to notify all staff to remember your face so that this never happens again.”  
When Hide’s father made no move, the man roughly grabbed him by the shirt and began to forcefully drag him off the unit. His mother walked quickly after them, her face red, eyes streaming with tears of embarrassment. All she did was watch as her son was beaten up right in front of him, it wasn’t like she was the one being hit at or insulted. What did she have to cry about.

“Did that seriously just fucking happen?” Touka questioned, her voice seething and in awe that someone would actually do that to their kid in front of other people’s eyes. Especially those taking care of their son and those who have dealt with child abuse in the past.

“That’s enough. There’s nothing to see here. It’s over. If you feel like you need to talk to someone, Yomo and myself are here to talk to,” Irimi said, loud enough for the whole unit to hear. Shuu had his hand over his mouth, Yoriko looked about ready to cry while Kanae just looked away uncomfortably. Kaneki didn’t move an inch, his head was turned in the direction Yomo left with Hide’s parents.

“Chika, are you okay?” Nishiki asked, his voice soft, butserious. Hide hated hearing his voice. He hated the sympathy, he hated the way they were looking at him. He wondered if he could get away with brushing himself off and smiling cheerfully while walking away, like nothing happened, but he knew they would all see right through it. Instead, Hide curled up inside of himself, refusing to move an inch.

I want to die. I really really really want to die. I want to slit my wrist. I want to bleed out. I want to fucking die. Everyone is staring at me. Everyone’s opinions are changing. They know the truth. They know how much I’m hurting. I can’t take it back now. I’m so stupid. I should’ve tried harder. I should’ve sprinted to my room when I saw their faces. Kill me. Just please kill me. Hide stared at the ground, unmoving.

“Dude, come on don’t do that,” Nishiki sighed, looking over at Touka for advice who only shrugged, still pissed and muttering about what a huge piece of shit Hide’s dad was. Nishiki then looked up at Kaneki who snapped out of his own wrath to look behind him to check Hide’s wellbeing. Irimi went behind the nurse’s desk to retrieve a first aid kit while Kaneki knelt down in front of Hide.

“Hide, I am so sorry. You didn’t deserve that. I lost my cool, but I couldn’t…the way he was shoving you around like that,” Kaneki said as he reached his hands up to pet his hair, but Hide couldn’t hear him over the sound of the voice inside his head telling him he was worthless, that he should die. Irimi rushed over with the kit and forced Hide to look up so she could take a look at his wounds. Hide stared ahead, his eyes glazed over and blank. He barely flinched when Irimi’s hands grazed over his eye which was beginning to swell shut or when she tried to wipe the blood away from his nose and split lip. Kaneki frowned and held onto Hide’s hand, resisting the urge to let the rage boiling up inside him to take over.

Yomo quickly returned to the unit after leading Hide’s parents off hospital grounds, his jaw was set and his eyes cold and serious. Hide was certain his parents said less than pleasant things about Hide, the hospital, or Yomo as they were being dragged off, and he was also certain that Yomo would be recording every word and action that happened in his charting alongside Irimi’s. Great.

“How was that?” Irimi asked, not looking up from what she was doing.

“I managed,” Yomo simply responded, his eyes lingering on Hide, softening momentarily in sympathy. Hide felt like he was gonna puke with the amount of attention he was getting.

“Why the hell would they do something like that!? Honestly how fucked up do you have to be-“

“Touka, that’s enough. Drop it,” Yomo responded sternly.

“Do you want some ice for your eye?” Irimi asked, ignoring what Touka said in favor on focusing on Hide who was feeling himself beginning to step over the edge. When Hide   
didn’t respond, Irimi assumed he had a concussion and went through the procedure to check him for one. When she found he wasn’t suffering from a concussion she assumed that perhaps he was in shock.

“Okay, Nishiki and Kaneki, help him to his bed. Let’s let him rest for a bit,” Irimi suggested, though she seemed hesitant, like she wished she could do more. So many of the patients watched the scene go down and she didn’t feel like this was the proper time to force him to talk about what exactly went on in that room, though everyone could hear it. She decided having him rest would be the best decision while she talked to the rest of the patients on the unit to give them time to process the scene. Usually if something like this were to go down, they would herd the patients back into their rooms to provide patients who were freaking out an environment that would be less overwhelming and help give them privacy. A lot of patients felt embarrassed after causing a scene, so it helped to make it less embarrassing for them. It also prevented other patients from getting hurt, and helped the staff to focus on the unstable patient.

Nishiki sighed, but obediently helped Hide up on his feet while Kaneki took his other side, his gray eyes dark with concern. Touka busied herself with comforting her girlfriend who was now crying into her shoulder, while Shuu and Kanae were whispering to each other as they watched Hide walk by.

“You got him from here?” Nishiki asked as they arrived at the entrance of their room. His tone of voice was unnerving to Hide. Where was the tinge of annoyance he always had in his voice, even when deep down he truly cared about someone else’s wellbeing? It wasn’t there. It was so uncharacteristic of Nishiki.

“Yeah, I got him. Thanks, Nishiki.”

“No problem. I’ll make sure those fuckers don’t spread what happened around the hospital. I’ll beat their pretty faces in.”

“I’m sure it’s already half-way around by now, the staff probably saw Yomo drag them out.”

“Won’t stop me from trying.”

Once Nishiki left and the two of them were alone Kaneki closed the door behind them and led him to their bed. “Hide…talk to me. What’s going on inside your head?” Kaneki asked gently as he held Hide’s hand with his own.

“What do you think is going on inside my head?” Hide asked, his voice cracking, “I want to die. I seriously want to fucking die right now and I don’t know what to do to make these thoughts stop.”

“Hide…it’s okay. It’ll pass, I know it doesn’t feel like it now, but it’ll pass, and I’ll stay here with you while we wait for it to pass,” Kaneki whispered, his hand reaching up to caress Hide’s face, but the blonde only pulled away.

“Pass? Are you kidding me? None of this is going to pass, everyone is going to know that the Nagachika’s have a fucked-up son and that my dad lost his shit and beat the shit out of his son in a mental hospital. Their reputations are tarnished and they’re going to make my life a living hell to remind me of it. We have no home to go to when we get out of here. If I didn’t lose my cool like that, if I tried harder to control my feelings, maybe I could’ve tried to convince them to help me get my apartment back,” Hide sighed, tears gathering in his eyes, “I am a fucking idiot. I’m a disappointment and now everyone knows everything that I tried to keep under wraps for how long. I can’t hide from it now because they’ll know I’m just blowing smoke up their ass.”

“Hide you are not an idiot,” Kaneki said sternly, “You are not a disappointment. You may be in their eyes but you’re not in my eyes. You are beautiful, you are so strong, you’ve held onto this for so long and tried to stay strong for so long despite all of this. There is nothing I would change about you and I promise I will show you just how much I appreciate you being here and being alive. You deserve to live.”

“You’re just saying that,” Hide sniffled.

“Hideyoshi Nagachika, I am not, and you know I am not,” Kaneki responded, his voice quaking with emotion as he pressed his lips gently to Hide’s, aware of his split lip.

“I am going to show you just how beautiful you are,” Kaneki said determinedly as he pulled away, his eyes shining. Hide stared at Kaneki in confusion, his eyes looked tired and uncertain.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This scene contains sex. If you hate boy on boy sex, then please skip this chapter.

“I am going to show you just how beautiful you are,” Kaneki said determinedly as he pulled away, his eyes shining. Hide stared at Kaneki in confusion, his eyes looked tired and uncertain.

“Safe word is sunshine,” Kaneki whispered as he pressed his lips against Hide’s once again, his fingers entangling themselves into his hair to pull him closer. A soft whimper rose from Hide’s throat and he grabbed the back of Kaneki’s shirt, holding him close as desperation took over his body.

“Do you trust me Hide?” Kaneki asked as he pulled away again, panting softly as his soft gray eyes searched Hide’s. After a few moments of searching Kaneki’s eyes, Hide finally nodded and allowed Kaneki to push him down onto the bed

“Alright, let me know if I’m hurting you.”

Hide whimpered when Kaneki’s lips pressed themselves against his, then began to trail down his jawline and to his neck. He pulled his shirt up so his hands could wander over Hide’s torso, his fingernails leaving goosebumps in their wake as Kaneki attacked his neck, drawing out whimpers from Hide. Finding his shirt was getting in the way, Kaneki pulled up Hide’s shirt further, gesturing that he wanted to take it off. Hide lifted the upper half of his body up off the bed and helped Kaneki get the offending article of clothing off.

“God, you’re so beautiful Hide,” Kaneki sighed before he leaned down to attack Hide’s collarbone, his fingers beginning to play with the cute, little pink buds of Hide’s nipples. A whine caught in Hide’s throat, lifting his upper body off the bed, wanting more, though he didn’t understand why this felt so good.  
Kaneki trailed kisses down Hide’s chest, making sure to press kisses to the scars that marred his skin before he looked up at Hide, making sure he was still okay with what was going on. “Is everything still feeling okay?”

“Y-Yeah, I-I don’t know w-why this feels so good…” Hide choked out, a light pink dusting his cheeks and his eyes narrowed down into lustful slits.

“Don’t think, just feel,” Kaneki said as he moved his mouth over to one of Hide’s pink buds and took it in his mouth, smirking a little bit when he heard the soft gasp that escaped Hide’s mouth. “Looks like someone has sensitive nipples,” Kaneki said, his voice muffled as he sucked on the bud that was beginning to harden.

“Fuck every part of my being is sensitive around you. I don’t know what the hell you do to me.”

“Really? In that case let’s find out just how sensitive you are,” Kaneki said. After seeing to it that both nipples were cared for, Kaneki trailed kisses down Hide’s stomach, taking his time to gently press kisses down the deep scar that ran down the side of his stomach. Hide watched Kaneki take his time moving down to the hem of his jeans.

“Is this still okay?” Kaneki asked, his gray eyes half-lidded as he looked up at Hide whose face began to go a shade dark at just how close Kaneki was to his dick.

“U-Uhhh…y-yeah I think. A-Are you doing what I think you are gonna do?”

“If it’s okay, I would love to.”

“I never had one before…”

“That’s okay, your job is just to sit back and enjoy it.”

“But what about you?”

“Let’s focus on you for right now, alright honey? Just try to keep a little quiet, we don’t want to be caught.”

“Okay…” Hide trailed off as he watched Kaneki slowly unbutton his jeans and unzipped them. With Hide’s help he slowly moved his jeans and boxers down, his half hard on popping up to say hello. Hide felt his stomach tighten nervously at the fear of the unknown, but when Kaneki smiled sweetly up at Hide his nerves began to dissipate. When Kaneki gave a timid lick up Hide’s shaft, the blonde’s head fell against the pillow and he closed his eyes, focusing on the pleasure Kaneki was giving him.

“Oh fuuucckk,” Hide moaned softly as he felt Kaneki wrap his lips around his dick and slowly begin to take him in his mouth. His hand wandered down to entangle itself into Kaneki’s white hair and he resisted the urge to whine loudly when Kaneki began to hum around his dick in amusement. When Hide looked down at Kaneki again, he saw that Kaneki almost had his entire dick in his mouth and was eagerly sucking him off and holy shit that was hot! Kaneki wasn’t lying when he said he was experienced. Why was that so hot and what did he do to deserve this beauty sucking him off like his life depended on it? He realized he must’ve said that aloud because Kaneki laughed again around his dick and a strangled whine was ripped from his throat when he felt those sweet vibrations send waves of pleasure throughout his body.

“Shit if you keep doing that I’m not gonna last long,” Hide whined, tears beginning to collect at the corners of his eyes. He almost cried when he felt that sweet warmth of Kaneki’s mouth pulls away from his member in favor of discarding his own shirt and pants. Hide felt his face turn dark red when he saw Kaneki’s own arousal stand up nice and proud for Hide. It looked a lot bigger than it did when they first saw each other naked.

Seeing his frustrated look Kaneki gave Hide another sweet smile, his voice a little hoarse from what he was doing, “I know, but I can’t have you coming just yet. There’s still something I want to do if you are okay with it.”

Hide tilted his head in confusion, his eyes widening when Kaneki presented him with three of his fingers with one command, “Suck my fingers and make sure you coat them with plenty of saliva. I don’t want to hurt you.”

Hide blinked, staring at Kaneki, his pupils blown wide.

“Don’t worry, I’ll try my hardest not to hurt you. Remember the safe word is sunshine.”

Hide nodded softly as he hesitantly opened his mouth and ran his tongue over each of Kaneki’s digits. While Kaneki waited patiently for Hide to sufficiently coat his fingers he began to stroke his own erection, his eyes raking over Hide’s body appreciatively.

“God, I love you, I wish you could see what I’m seeing right now.” Kaneki moaned, bucking his hips into his hand. Hide tried to reach down to touch Kaneki, but the whitette smirked mischievously and batted his hand away, “Nu uh no touching. Not right now.”

After a few moments, Kaneki gently removed his fingers from Hide’s mouth and looked at him, a soft question in his eyes.

“Okay. This is going to feel a little weird but I’m going to stick my fingers up inside you and prepare you. It might hurt a little bit, but I promise I’m going to make you feel really good in a little bit. Does that sound okay?” Kaneki asked.

Hide felt his cheeks burn as realization dawned on him on what Kaneki was planning to do. His dick gave a tiny twitch at the suggestion but Hide would be lying if he didn’t say he didn’t feel nervous. Kaneki waited patiently for his response, his eyes reflecting understanding and adoration.

“Is it…are you sure it’s gonna fit?”

“Yes, it’ll fit. I’ll go nice and slow.”

“O-Okay…” Hide nodded, spreading his legs a little bit in anticipation.

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah…”

“Let me know if I’m hurting you,” Kaneki said as he finally inserted one digit inside of him. Hide’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion at Kaneki’s finger probing his insides. It felt really freaking weird. Soon enough Kaneki added a second finger and began to stretch Hide, that part began to hurt a little bit, but nothing he couldn’t handle.

“Let’s see…where is it at,” Kaneki mumbled to himself as his fingers continued to probe inside of him.

“What are you looking for-Oh god!” Hide yelped as he saw stars explode behind his eyes, and his head thudding back against the pillow. He shoved his hands to his mouth in fear that they heard him, but Kaneki only laughed, “Looks like I found it.”

Kaneki curled his fingers inside Hide again, causing the other to arch his back off the bed and moan against his hands.

“Oh god what is tha-Oh god Kaneki!”

“Your prostate. The faces your making right now is absolutely erotic,” Kaneki smiled, biting his bottom lip as he did it again, his eyes glazing over lustfully as he saw Hide come undone because of his fingers. He loved being in control for once. He quickly added a third finger to join the other two in stretching out Hide that was writhing underneath him.

“D-Don’t stop. Oh god please don’t stop,” Hide squirmed under him as Kaneki kept sending bolts of pleasure shooting up his spine. He felt the coil in his stomach tighten and he knew it would only be a matter of time. When Kaneki threatened to remove his fingers, his fingers barely brushing up against that sweet spot in Hide, Kaneki laughed when he felt Hide’s walls clamped down on his fingers.

“Soon, I promise,” Kaneki said as he removed his fingers in favor of spitting into his hand and slicking up his member. Hide preoccupied himself by watching Kaneki’s movements, feeling his stomach flutter in excitement and nervousness. When Kaneki finished he turned his attention to Hide as he lined himself up at Hide’s entrance.

“Is this still okay?” Kaneki asked, his eyes searching his lover’s for any sign of hesitation.

“Yeah…I’m just a little nervous,” Hide breathed out, tensing slightly when he felt Kaneki probe at his entrance, “I trust you…”

Kaneki nodded and gently grabbed Hide’s hand, not at all like the harsh grasp Akane had on his wrist the first time he made love, “If you want to stop at any time, let me know. I mean it, Hide. You don’t even have to use the safe word, just tell me to stop and I will stop instantly no questions asked. Okay?”

“Okay?”

“I plan on taking it slow. Is there anything else I can do to make this easier on you?”

“Yeah…I-I want to see your face…and don’t let go of my hand. That sounds so childish, I’m sorry.”

“No it doesn’t,” Kaneki said sternly as he pressed his lips against Hide’s before he whispered against them, “I want you to relax as much as possible and take deep breaths. It   
might take a bit to get used to.”

“Okay…” Hide said to let Kaneki knew he heard as Kaneki placed one of his legs over his shoulder. His other hand guided his member as he slowly began to push inside Hide. Hide gasped in pain but forced himself to stay as relaxed as he possibly could. He squeezed the hand in his own, gritting his teeth as he felt himself slowly being stretched out.

“Fuck Hide you feel so good….you’re so tight,” Kaneki praised as he ran his thumb over Hide’s hand, a few white strands fell into his face as he concentrated on taking his time. He wanted to make this as comfortable and as special as he could for Hide. Hide whimpered as he felt Kaneki push deeper and tried to resist the urge to cry because holy shit was Kaneki huge, or maybe Hide just really sucked at taking it. Either way, he trusted that it would feel better sooner or later.

“Breathe baby. Do you need me to stop?” Kaneki whispered his thumb coming up to brush against one of Hide’s eye to brush away the moisture that collected there.

“No. I want it,” Hide whimpered, mentally kicking himself because his voice was cracking and sounded unconfident. “Sorry, I’m almost all in I promise,” Kaneki panted, his eyebrows furrowed in concern, but he continued to push further, trusting that Hide would let him know if he seriously wanted to stop. Once Kaneki was all the way in he stayed as   
still as possible, his empty hand reaching down to stroke Hide’s erection which was beginning to go down from neglect. Kaneki whispered praise and sweet nothings, waiting for Hide to get used to having him inside of him. He wanted to cry. He had second thoughts about continuing what he was doing to Hide, he never meant to make this painful for him, but he also wanted to show him how much he loved him. He wanted to make him forget his worries through pleasuring him and touching him in ways that would make what Akane did to him a far-off memory.

After a few moments Hide’s whimpering subsided, the pain beginning to lessen to something more tolerable, “S-Sorry…”

“Don’t be. The first time can be a little painful. I’m sure if we had actual lubricant it would feel a lot better. Is it feeling a little better?”

“Y-Yeah…you can move I think.”

Kaneki nodded, moving his hand to cup Hide’s face lovingly before he began to slowly move, trying to angle his hips to find that spot that’ll have Hide on cloud nine. Hide grunted, clutching Kaneki’s hand as he willed himself to focus on Kaneki’s face, willing himself to stay in reality. After a few more thrusts Hide’s body snapped forward his hand shooting to his mouth, barely stifling the loud moan that threatened to bubble out from his throat when he saw white light flash behind his eyes.

Kaneki sighed, relieved that he managed the find that spot again. He angled his hips, so he would be able to continue to hit that spot before he thrusted back in, leaning down to swallow Hide’s moan with his mouth. Hide’s grip on Kaneki’s hand tightened, not out of pain, but to hold on as he felt wave after wave of pleasure rip through him. This wasn’t at all like the pleasure he felt with Akane. It was slower, there was whispers of love in soft, breathy voices. As Hide looked up at Kaneki, he felt himself being swallowed up into those gray pools, that stared deeply into his. Those eyes poured out so much unconditional love that he felt tears begin to roll down his cheeks. Hide unraveled his hand from Kaneki’s in favor of grabbing Kaneki’s face, his hands shaking as he felt himself slowly rise up to his peak.

“H-Hide,” Kaneki moaned, panting loudly as he continued to buck his hips against his lover. Oh god the way Hide was looking at him right now nearly sent him over the edge. No. Not yet. He was going to make Hide come first. He felt his chest hurt with how much love was reflected in those amber eyes. He was never looked at that way before and he desperately tried to burn that look into his mind. That look was for him and him alone, there was no mask, it was genuine, and Kaneki was surprised to find his own tears beginning to fall down on Hide.

“I-I love you. G-Gah-ah! I l-love you so much, K-Kaneki!” Hide sobbed, feeling his stomach tighten.

“G-God Hide, you’re a-amazing. I-I’m so happy you’re alive,” Kaneki sobbed, his pace quickening as he felt himself getting close. He felt like he was burning on the inside, like Hide was filling him up with his essence instead of the other way around.

“S-Stay alive for me.”

“Never l-leave.”

“I love you. Y-You’re my sun.”

“Y-You’re my stars. My moon.”

“You’re my air.”

Hide moaned loudly, his hands clutching onto Kaneki’s hair, “A-Ahh I’m close!”

“It’s okay, I got you,” Kaneki moaned, leaning down to press his lips against Hide, his hips thrusting erratically as he held Hide close. In just a few more thrusts Hide was finally pushed over the edge with a choked cry that Kaneki swallowed with his lips, not really caring if anyone heard as he felt Hide’s seed spill against their stomachs. Kaneki quickly followed, a loud groan ripping itself from his throat as he rode out his orgasm. Hide whined as he felt Kaneki fill him up, his body shaking as he came down from his high as soft whispers of “I love you” escaped his lips.

Kaneki collapsed on top of Hide, panting heavily as he tried to regain his sense of breathing. He pressed his cheek to Hide’s chest, listening to fast pace of his heartbeat as it fought to calm down. After a few minutes listening to Hide’s heart slow down to a normal beat, Kaneki slowly lifted his head to find Hide’s sparkling amber ones staring down at him, his hand playing with his hair lazily.

“Feel better?” Kaneki asked.

“I feel like a bazillion dollars…” Hide slurred with a lazy smile.

“That’s not a real number…”

“You’re killing the mood Kaneki.”

Kaneki giggled, tracing circles into Hide’s chest.

“I’m surprised no one busted down the door to break us up.” Kaneki said.

“I think they heard, but nobody was willing to see us in our naked glory. I think your ass would’ve blinded them anyways,” Hide responded with a joking smirk as Kaneki slapped his chest lightly. Kaneki groaned as he slowly got up and went to pull out of Hide, but the blonde quickly put his hands on his waist to stop him, “No, don’t pull out. I mean….just a little longer?”

“Okay,” Kaneki said, happy to lay back down on Hide’s chest once again.

“I’m glad that I finally got to experience this on my own terms. I’m sorry if I hurt you. I know what it’s like to be in that position and it was never my intent to cause you pain,” Kaneki said after a few minutes of silence.

“I’m glad to…and don’t worry about it. I knew you weren’t trying to hurt me. That was exactly what I wanted my first time to be like. It was amazing,” Hide mumbled, his eyes too heavy to hold open any longer.

Kaneki smiled, reaching his hand up to ruffle up Hide’s hair, “As much as I love this, I better clean us both up before things dry too much and the staff come checking on you. You are on fifteen minute checks love.”

Hide hummed, making a move to get up and help but Kaneki pressed a hand on his chest to stop him, “No, it’s okay. I got it. You’ve already been through enough for today.”  
The blonde whined, but obeyed his lover and stayed on the bed, frowning as he felt Kaneki’s warmth leave him. He felt empty, figuratively, and literally when he felt Kaneki pull out to walk over to his closet. He decided to use his shirt he discarded during their love-making to clean them both off. He gently wiped up his seed beginning to leak out of Hide and once he cleaned them up to the best of his ability, he coaxed Hide to lift up his body so that they could slip under the covers. Hide was already snoring softly by the time Kaneki was under the covers which gave Kaneki the opportunity to admire his sleeping form. Sure, he didn’t like the bruise forming on his cheek, the cut on his lip, or the dried blood in his nostrils. It made the rage come back burning in his stomach that someone would dare mess up his face like that. Kaneki frowned and moved forward to press a gentle kiss to Hide’s forehead before he nestled himself, so his head was under his neck and his cheek was pressed to his chest again to listen to his heart. He allowed himself to be lulled to sleep by the calming rhythm, feeling useful that he was able to chase away Hide’s pain and to give him a reason to keep living.


	11. Chapter 11

A couple of weeks have passed since his parents had visited. The staff must’ve thought that the two of them were progressing quite well since they were allowed to have privileges starting a week ago. That meant during specific times the two of them could walk around the hospital alone with no staff escort. They could go to the rec center, the courtyard outside, or the hospital’s library, which Kaneki took full advantage of. Hide was also taken off of his suicide watch which was something Hide nearly cried in joy from. Finally, he could take a shower without something staring at him! He could go to the bathroom in peace! No longer did he have to have the door to his room opened and closed every fifteen minutes when they checked up on them.

Over the two weeks the two had decorated their room with even more drawings. The dark drawings that Kaneki had drawn over the years were slowly being replaced by more positive ones, mostly depicting the future he imagined they would have together. Thanks to Hide, there were also silly doodles that made Kaneki smile or laugh softly whenever he looked at them. The first day they had their privileges the two of them explored the hospital together to see what the place had to offer. Since the day he had been admitted, Kaneki had never had privileges, so it was a new experience for the both of them. Kaneki always had books brought to him. He was never able to go to the library and choose the books he wanted to read, which wasn’t such a bad thing since Irimi knew what kind of books he’d like. The library’s selection was small, but it meant the world for Kaneki to even be surrounded by shelves full of books, so they went back daily to exchange the books he read last night for new ones. Kaneki barely went outside, even though the staff tried to take him out on his better days which were very seldom before Hide came. That being said, they tried to incorporate some time in the sun daily for his sake, though Kaneki liked to say it was because Hide needed it the most since he was basically the personification of the sun.

This also gave them more opportunities to socialize with the people on their unit. Though they’d never admit it, Hide was sure they all knew and heard of the two’s night of love-making and it was Shuu who tipped him off. After that day Shuu kept glaring at him for a solid three days, refusing to talk to Hide or acknowledge he was there. He got over it though, or at least Hide thought he did because after those three days all he had eyes for was Kanae. He seemed determined to make the four of them go on a double date when they were all discharged from the hospital. In between therapy sessions and college work, the two of them took advantage of their small amount of freedom. They hung out at the rec center with Nishiki, Touka, and Yoriko where they watched stupid sitcoms on their crappy T.V.s or played basketball in their mini basketball court. Kaneki and Yoriko sat on the sidelines watching their loves shoot some hoops, sometimes accompanied by Kimi who came to visit Nishiki. Hide usually was the middle man that broke up Nishiki and Touka when they got a little too competitive with each other.

They’d spend their time outside with Shuu and Kanae where Shuu gushed about his knowledge of flowers. Hide and Shuu found common ground with music while Kaneki and Kanae gushed about the dumb, stupid things that their boyfriends did or books they’ve read. Kanae was surprisingly a huge book worm thanks to Shuu and his large collection of books. They’d also met a little girl named Hinami who was on the adolescent unit and who was also a dear friend of Touka’s. She also loved books, though she struggled to read. Kaneki immediately hit it off with her and began to tutor her on the days she happened to be out in the courtyard. As far as Hide could see, Kaneki and himself were on a rollercoaster that was only going up and the rest of their peers were happy to see the once unstable Kaneki finally find something positive in his life.

On Hide’s end, he still hated his therapy sessions with Marude, but had managed to open up a bit more and act less bratty around the man. He was still a sarcastic little shit to him though. He hated the prodding, which only got worse when he found out about what happened between him and his parents. Recently at his last session Marude earned some major points with Hide when he gave him an old, green, Ipod shuffle that had paint chipping off. He said he found it around his house and he wasn’t using it anymore, so he downloaded some songs from the bands Hide mentioned in his first session. It was nearly a whole month since Hide had listened to a song. He absolutely refused to listen to the shit the hospital provided, which were lyricless and mostly had whale or beach noises.

Hide couldn’t believe it as he held the tiny device in his hand. He actually started bawling right in front of Marude in joy. It wasn’t his beloved phone, but it was still his music. His saving grace before Kaneki came along. After the session, Marude told him that if he ever thought of more songs he’d like on it, he should write them down and give it to him so he could get them on his laptop and transfer them onto the shuffle during one of their sessions. When Hide got back to the unit that day he ran directly to his room and excitedly woke Kaneki from a nap to shriek over the device in excitement. Together they listened to the songs that Marude had downloaded onto it and since then Hide carried the device wherever he went. When Marude’s sessions got to be too annoying, Hide would go visit Uta with Kaneki and chill out in the room. Uta would hook up the Ipod shuffle to his computer so that the music was pumping out throughout the room. It gave a nice, creative space for drawing or just relaxing.

Everything was positive, and the world was bursting with color. Hide was sure they’d be out of here in no time. Of course, with every rollercoaster, there was bound to a be a huge drop and that huge drop came another week later, on a day that started relatively normal. Let’s face it, every time there was supposed to be a bad day, things start out surprisingly normal which leaves you unaware of the major ass kicking you were about to receive. The two of them woke up together, well okay, not really. Hide woke up first and kissed Kaneki silly until he woke up. Kaneki’s cognitive behavior counselor had something they had to do during his usual session time, so they moved it to be an hour before lunch.

Hide was a little disappointed that he wouldn’t get to walk with Kaneki down to the dining area, but Kaneki assured him that afterwards they’d be able to hang out for the rest of the day. For the first part of the day, Hide busied himself with school work, drawing, or listening to music as he waited for lunch to roll around so he could see his lover again. It felt like an eternity before it came, but then again everything felt like eternity without Kaneki. In every book or movie he read or saw, there seemed to always be that cliché’ moment the main character has before something goes wrong. They always talk about feeling something wrong in the air, something to do with tension in the air, or poisonous. That day Hide didn’t feel anything in the air, but he figured it was because he was living in his own little fantasy of ‘everything was going to turn out just fine because he was in love.’ He found his soul mate, the man of his dreams! They were going to get a house, adopt kids or maybe a pet. They were going to see the world together! Nothing could destroy this!

As they were making their way towards the dining area the hallways were filled with a lot more commotion than they usually were. Soon they found out the reason why when an urgent voice talked over the intercom.

“We have a code black, repeat we have a code black. Yamori Oomori has escaped from the maximum-security unit. He’s wearing a plain white shirt and white pants. He is about 6’1 with light blonde hair. All staff are to remain on high alert and to help within your limits.”

“Code black?” Hide asked.

“Oh fuck, that’s Jason,” Nishiki cursed.

“Jason?” Hide asked, feeling as if he was going to be sick as he ran full speed to the dining area.

“Hideyoshi Nagachika stop! You are to stay within the group!” Koma shouted.

 

But Hide didn’t hear him as he ran, “Kaneki! Kaneki are you o-“

Hide stopped right in his tracks, his mouth dropping open at the sight of a huge, white-blonde, hulking figure standing in front of Kaneki. Kaneki’s face was a sickly pale as his gray, fearful eyes looked from the figure, down to Hide. His eyes only turned more fearful. Everyone else that was in the dining hall didn’t dare make a move as they cowered around Jason. The man laughed as he slowly turned around, revealing his slicked back, blonde hair and narrowed eyes that reminded Hide of a lizard’s.

“Well well well, you didn’t tell me you made a friend Kaneki,” the man said in a cold, deep voice.

Kaneki swallowed hard, his eyes narrowed in threatening slits, when he spoke his voice had a hardened edge to it that Hide only heard once before when he had his father’s fist against his hand, “Don’t you dare take a step towards him”

“Or what? Are you telling me you’re going to stop me? What a bright little thing you’ve gotten yourself here. I’ve heard some rumors going around that the infamous Kaneki Ken final found the cure to his insanity, who knew it would be this little, pathetic worm. I hope you don’t mind sharing,” Jason snarled as he stepped closer to Hide who crouched down and took a step back. He tried to swallow back his fear, reminding himself of all the horrible things this man did to Kaneki and thought of his parents to fuel himself up on rage, rather than fear. It worked at least somewhat, but as Hide looked at his huge, meaty hands, he knew that if this guy grabbed him he was shit out of luck. That’s okay though, after years of fighting with his father he found he was good at thinking on his feet. He knew with Jason’s hulking figure he might not be very fast, so Hide would take his smaller figure to his advantage.

“Hide, get out of here! Run!” Kaneki yelled just as Jason sent a fist towards Hide’s face.

With a gasp, Hide quickly ducked down and ran under Jason’s arm as fast as he could, his eyes searching frantically around the dining hall for weapons. When he looked behind him, the fist Jason had sent through the wall had cracked the cement brick that lay underneath. Kaneki grabbed Hide’s sleeve of his jacket and pulled him towards him.

“Hide, listen to me. I’m going to distract him. I want you to run as fast as you can and get out of here. Get a staff member to let you back in to your unit. Jason knows your face and will stop at nothing to come after you. Do you hear me? Run!”

“Look, I hear you, but you’re crazy if you think I’m going to leave this brick wall to you to fight alone. We’re in this together! Your fight is my fight to. I want to help!” Hide said, his amber eyes blazing in determination.

“Hide…no!”

Hide smirked and pressed a quick kiss to Kaneki’s lips, “I love you!” before he looked behind him to see Jason coming after them with a maniacal grin, “Split!”

Hide pushed Kaneki away from him and took off towards one side while Kaneki charged towards the other side. Hide ran around the tables, collecting silverware and shoving them into his pockets to use as weapons, before grabbing someone’s tray, “Sorry need this.”

This time Jason was heading for Kaneki, madly cackling, “What a disgustingly cute display! I’m going to have fun tearing him to shreds right in front of you!”

Kaneki growled and shoved a table down to block Jason’s path to give him more time, but Jason only picked it up and threw it back towards Kaneki like it meant nothing. Kaneki dodged luckily, but he was reaching towards one of the far walls and with how close Jason was to him, he would be able to reach out to him in seconds before he had time to run in another direction.

“Oi meat bag, you forgot about me!” Hide shouted as he flung empty tray in his hand like a frisbee as hard as he could which connected with Jason’s upper back. He wanted to get his head, but he was fine with the fact he even got Jason at all. Kaneki used Jason’s distraction as an opportunity to run up the wall, flipping over to land on Jason’s shoulder’s before he had time to turn around towards Hide. With a twisted grin Kaneki jabbed his fingers into Jason’s eye sockets as hard as he could.

“Don’t you even think of hurting him! We’re not done yet!”

“You piece of shit! Get off of me!” Jason hollered, attempting to ram his back against a wall to throw Kaneki off, Kaneki quickly jumped off his shoulders and ran back towards Hide who stood there with a gaping mouth.

“Holy shit that was awesome!” Hide fan boyed. If they weren’t having their lives threatened he would probably feel turned on by the way Kaneki fought.

“Thanks for the distraction,” Kaneki yelled back at Hide with a smile, which didn’t last long as Jason composed himself and was barreling towards them, this time towards Hide.

“My turn! Sorry pal, but you’re gonna need some more speed to catch this little bunny rabbit, “Hide sing-songed, although he felt nervous. He thought Jason would be slow with his mass, but it turned out he was quite fast when he was pissed off enough. His best bet was zig zag around and hope he sucked at sharp turns. It turned out pretty well for a while, Hide would run around and turn at the last second when coming towards a wall, smirking victoriously when he heard a thud and Jason groan in frustration while he waited for Kaneki’s next attack. Hide was starting to tire though, and the floors of the dining hall were not always great for traction so when Hide was about ready to take another sharp turn in the opposite direction to always keep Jason guessing, he slipped and lost his footing. Oh shit!

“Well, it looks like the little bunny lost his steam. Now it’s my turn!” Jason yelled as he grabbed Hide by the collar of his jacket and sent him flying into a table, hard enough to split it in to.

“Hide! Hold on!” Kaneki screamed.

Hide gasped painfully as the air that was knocked out of his lungs returned. Most of his back took the blow but that didn’t make it hurt any less. Jason laughed and lurched towards him to grab him around the neck, choking off his air supply as he slammed him against the wall making Hide see stars.

“Oh, look at this, you even provided me with weapons,” the man sneered as he pulled out a fork from Hide’s pocket and stabbed it into his thigh, before twisting the metal. A scream ripped out of Hide’s throat.

“Leave him alone!” Kaneki hollered before coming at Jason with a pot of scalding stew that he stole from the kitchen and throwing it up against his back. The kitchen staff only cowered when Kaneki jumped through the tiny window in search of a weapon, which both made him happy because they wouldn’t put up a fuss, but also pissed him off because they were supposed to have the tools necessary to take down Jason.

Jason hollered and dropped Hide to the ground who smiled at Kaneki, despite seeing doubles of his lover.

“You little worthless worm! I’m going to kill you, I’m going to tear you limb from limb! I’m going to make you watch as I devour your friend!” Jason screamed, Hide looked over towards the entrance of the dining hall, noting with disgust and some gratefulness when he saw some staff finally arrive. What the hell took them so long! Kaneki threw the pot to the side, preparing to run, but he slipped on some stew that had been spilled. Jason grabbed Kaneki by the leg and threw him against a wall, his head cracking sickeningly against it.

“Kaneki!” Hide yelled, trying to stab Jason when he walked towards him, but he acted like he didn’t feel it as he didn’t let up on Kaneki. He grabbed him by the head, slamming his head over and over into the wall, blood flying everywhere and down Kaneki’s pale face, staining his white hair. When that wasn’t enough, Jason punched the now unconscious Kaneki, slamming him against the wall, kicking him, and no matter how hard Hide screamed or tried to distract him he wouldn’t stop.

“Leave him alone! You’re killing him! If you want to kill someone kill me instead!” Hide screamed, trying to rip Jason’s hands away from Kaneki, but he only shoved him back like he was an annoying fly. As a last-ditch effort, Hide grabbed Jason’s arm and bit down as hard as he could.

“You little brat!” Jason yelled slamming his head into the ground, his vision going black for a little bit, his ears ringing. He didn’t care, just as long as he stopped going after Kaneki. Why weren’t the staff doing anything? What was taking them so long? Hide slowly opened his eyes to look at Kaneki who lay bloodied and broken, his chest was still moving, but just barely. How dare he, how dare he come into their lives and shatter every amount of progress they made over the past couple of months. How dare he ruin the only thing in Hide’s life that finally made sense, that gave him color, that gave him a heightened sense of life that music never could.

For the second time since he was admitted, Hide felt himself boil over with rage, but this was different. He wasn’t fighting for understanding, he wanted blood, he wanted this fucker to suffer as much as he made Kaneki suffer. He wanted Jason to die. Hide got up, staggering as he held onto his thigh that was bleeding, the fork still lodged in it. The staff finally jumped in and were surrounding Jason, but Jason easily over-powered them and threw them aside. They needed more staff. Where was Yomo? Where was Koma? Hide gritted his teeth as he pulled the utensil out of his thigh, his stomach boiling, skin burning, and seeing red.

“You bastard!” Hide yelled as he sprinted towards Jason, ignoring the sickeningly throbbing in his head, the throbbing of his thigh, the smell of blood as he shoved the fork as deep as it would go into Jason’s back. He wasn’t done yet though. When Jason turned around, Hide jumped up onto Jason’s arms that tried to grab him before grabbing a knife from his pocket and jabbing it deep into Jason’s eye socket.

Jason howled and clutched at his eye, his eyes glazed over with intent to kill, but instead of feeling fear Hide only felt angrier. Before Jason had time to speed towards Hide, a figure jumped out from the side and sent a hard kick to the side of his face, sending him to the ground with a loud thud.

“Oi ugly! Mind if I join in?”

Hide whipped his head around, his eyes meeting Nishiki who smirked at him, “Hey there dumbass, you owe me big time for this.”

Hide ignored him, feeling rage that Nishiki stepped into the fight. This was his and Kaneki’s and he was gonna be the one to take Jason out! The blonde took this opportunity to dash towards the fallen Jason, grabbing a knife from his pocket before he leaned over Jason.

“I’m going to fucking kill you! I’ll make you pay for everything you did to him!” Hide growled, his voice sounding like someone else’s as he loomed over Jason who was regaining his composure. Hide raised the blade up before plunging it deep into Jason’s abdomen. He pulled the weapon back out, his hands slick with the man’s blood before plunging it back down into his arm, then he plunged it into his side, his other eye, ignoring the screams that ripped out of Jason’s mouth.

“You took the only thing great I had! He didn’t even do anything to you! You’re a monster! Die! Die already! Never move again!”

“Whoa Hide, I wouldn’t do that! Dude calm down!” Nishiki shouted, “Touka are they here yet!?”

“Close! Don’t just stand there, get him!” Touka screamed back.

“Shuu, help me out here!”

Hide aimed the knife over Jason’s chest, ready to plunge the blade into his heart and his amber eyes burning with a reddish tint like he was taken over by a demon. Before he had the opportunity to move his hands down he felt a hand hook under both of his shoulders and pull him away from Jason.

“Sorry man, but we’re not gonna let you turn into a killer,” Nishiki grunted and with Shuu’s help they managed to pull a struggling, cursing Hide a few feet away from Jason.

“What the fuck are you doing! Butt out! He’s mine!” Hide yelled, sending his elbow back into Nishiki’s stomach.

“Oof! Fuck man calm down! Kaneki wouldn’t want you to do this!”

“You don’t know shit about him! You didn’t even try to reach out to him!” Hide screamed, attempting to strangle Nishiki, the anger becoming too much for him to control.

“Monsieur! Drop the knife! You don’t know what you’re doing,” Shuu yelled, grabbing Hide by the back of the jacket and pulling him off Nishiki and pushing on his shoulders until he was laying flat on the floor.

“Enough of this bull shit, you wanna fucking go Shittychika we will fucking go!” Nishiki yelled, pushing Shuu off in favor of taking his place, his arm reeled back and ready to punch Hide in the face, “We cared about him too you fuck, but he was too gun shy for us to get close to him!”

“Monsieur stop! Fighting isn’t the answer, you’ll only make it worse.”

“Listen to Master Shuu,” Kanae shouted, joining the struggle in now dragging Nishiki off of Hide.

“Nishiki stop, he’s already injured!” Yoriko yelled next.

“Drop the fucking knife Hide!” came Touka. While Shuu and Kanae dealt with Nishiki, a huge swarm of staff have finally arrived of the scene, including Koma, Yomo, and Yoshimura. While the three of them dealt with Jason alongside other buff staff members, the still strong, but less buff staff dealt with Kaneki. The vision of Kaneki’s head being pushed down in a painfully, awkward angle as he was given a sedative flooded Hide’s mind and fear quickly replaced the anger. Hide quickly broke away from his group of peers in favor of sprinting towards Kaneki.

“Stop! Don’t touch him! You’re going to make him freak out!” Hide shouted, his stomach shooting down to his stomach when he saw the oxygen mask they put over Kaneki’s face. He was only a few feet away from him when he was pushed forcefully to the ground, both arms violently pulled back behind his back that he felt his shoulder pop and pins and needles start in its place.

“Let go of me! Where are you taking him!? He needs me! You don’t understand!” Hide screamed at the top of his lungs, his eyes beginning to burn alongside his throat. This was it. This was the last time he’d see Kaneki and he wouldn’t even have the opportunity to tell him how much he loved him, how much he gave him just by simply being there, how much he appreciated his presence in such a trying time in his life. Hide tried in vain to struggle against the staff that held his arms and for a moment he felt their grip begin to loosen. Quickly more hands were added to his legs and a hand trying to push his head into the tile floor, but he fought against the hand until his neck hurt, straining to see Kaneki. He saw as they lifted his broken body onto the stretcher and he began to fight with every amount of strength he had in his body to try and a break away, but it was no use. Anxiety began to fill him up whole and he began to feel cold. He hadn’t realized how much he relied on Kaneki’s presence over the past couple of months to stay anxiety free and sane. Now that he was being taken away from him, for what seemed like for good.

“Where are you taking him!? Kaneki! Kaneki wake up! It wasn’t our fault, I was only protecting him! Get off of me!” Hide continued to scream, but he sounded more like an animal in it’s death throes than an actual human. He wasn’t ready to go back to the world before Kaneki. He didn’t want to go back. He wasn’t ready to return to the numbness. Even as Hide’s head was pushed painfully into the tile, Hide still turned his head to watch as Kaneki was led away, even though his cheek burned from the effort as it was scratched against the tile. He still fought, he still screamed Kaneki’s name, screamed at them to stop.

“I need a sedative,” a man’s voice shouted to one of the nurses.

No. No no no no! Please no! I’m not ready! I need to see him! I need to follow him! Please god don’t take him away from me! Take me with him! If he dies take me with him! I don’t want to fall asleep! Tears were pouring down his cheek, or at least he thought it was tears. He didn’t know if it was blood, sweat, or tears anymore and he didn’t care. All he knew was that he thought his chest was going to explode, he thought he was going to die, and his body was pulling towards Kaneki with everything it had, physically and spiritually.

“Leave him alone! Don’t push his head down like that! You’re hurting him!” Yoriko wailed, trying to run towards the staff that was restraining Hide, but she was pulled back by Touka.

“Don’t Yoriko, it’s too late,” Touka responded as she wrapped her up in her arms, hiding her away from the scene.

“Come on man! That’s not fair he was only trying to protect Kaneki!” Nishiki yelled, “Fucking idiot!”

“He really loved him…didn’t he Kanae?”

“Yes, Master Shuu.”

“I hope Kaneki recovers. I do not wish to see this sunflower die with his sunlight.”

Hide managed to twist his head around, catching the glimpse of the needle that glistened in the fluorescent light before it was stabbed into his thigh that wasn’t wounded with a sharp pain. In a matter of moments Hide felt his muscles began to relax out of his control and it frightened him. He didn’t like not having control over his body. He felt his eyes feel heavy, so fucking heavy, but he fought to stay awake. He needed to stay awake, he needed to stay alert! He needed to find a way to get to Kaneki! At first, he wondered where the strangled whimpers were coming from, but after a few moments and the way his throat burned every time the sound appeared, he realized it was him. He sounded pathetic. He couldn’t do anything. He was worthless.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry Kaneki…Nishiki…Yoriko…Shuu…Kanae….Touka,” Hide choked out softly, feeling all the energy drained out of him, his eyes rolling back as he plunged into a cold unconsciousness.


	12. Chapter 12

When he regained consciousness, he felt like he was run over by a freight train. His head felt like it was going to explode, and it throbbed nauseatingly. He could barely open his eyes and when he did the room was spinning and he felt his stomach lurch. With great difficulty he slowly tried to remember what happened and what got him into this state. It was blurry, but he remembered seeing a lot of blood. His blood, Kaneki’s blood, and Jason’s blood. The throbbing in his leg reminded him he was stabbed, but he couldn’t remember by what. He remembers feeling furious, so much so he couldn’t control himself. He knew Kaneki was gone and that was enough to make all the anxiety and pain come crashing back. He felt the cold begin to feel him, freezing him from the inside out.

“He’s awake,” a soft, female voice said.

“Alright, I’ll go let them know,” came a gruffer, female voice.

Yoriko and Touka, Hide deduced behind closed eyelids. He heard the squeak of a chair being pushed back and the sounds of soft footsteps retreating out the door.

“Hide. Do you remember who I am?” Yoriko asked as she gently touched his shoulder.

There was only one thing on his mind, “W-Where….is….he?” Hide choked out, his voice crackly. It hurt to speak.

“I’m sorry…but I don’t know. None of us know where he is or what his condition is. I’m so sorry.”

Hide felt his stomach drop. That meant his condition was bad right? He was on death’s door and Hide wasn’t there for him. He felt his stomach lurch and he rolled over in time to vomit what little he had in his stomach on the floor next to him.

“Hide!” Yoriko started, her eyes wincing in disgust, but she was determined to help her friend in need, so she took a deep breath and rubbed his back sympathetically,” It’s okay. You’re okay and Kaneki will be okay to.”

“Ugh, gross,” Touka winced when she returned with a staff member who called out for cleaning supplies. The two of them waited patiently until Hide was done, before the staff member made her assessment on Hide. He didn’t recognize her.

Though his throat was on fire and he felt like he was going to pass out he asked again, “Where is…he? H-How is he…?”

“I don’t know. Follow my finger,” the staff member said bluntly.

“No. Answer me. Where the hell is he?” Hide said, starting to get agitated.

The staff sighed in annoyance, “Will you just sit still and do what I told you? Just get over it. I don’t know what is with you people getting into relationships with each other, it’s not like you’re going to see each other again when you get discharged. For all we know he’s probably dead already.

Touka coughed out a laugh of disbelief, “You people?” and looked at Yoriko who frowned back at her. If Yoshimura was here he’d be livid to hear how the staff was talking to Hide. The blonde stayed quiet but obeyed. He wanted her gone as soon as possible so he could go back to sleep and hope he’d never wake up again. He could feel the void slowly consume him as he imagined a world without Kaneki in it.

“Concussion,” the staff said in conclusion, “I better not hear anymore whining out of you.”

“If he wasn’t Kaneki’s friend I would make him on purpose just to piss you off,” Touka commented with a glare.

“Touka,” Yoriko chided lightly as another staff member walked in and cleaned up the mess. Another one he didn’t recognize. Where were all the regular staff at? Hide closed his eyes, rejecting the world.

~

Then the nightmares started. The first one started out pleasantly, Hide woke up to a cerulean sky with a few clouds drifting lazily acrossed.

“Hide? Did you finally wake up?”

That voice. He felt a rush of giddiness go through him as he looked over at Kaneki. Instead of being bloodied and broken, his face held it’s same, pale, smooth beauty that made Hide melt. Kaneki was smiling at him, the tiny strip of white teeth showing between his lips. His eyes in the sunlight looked a pale blue. He hoped that this wasn’t a dream.

“You’re such a beautiful sight to wake up to. I missed you…” Hide smiled lazily as he turned over to look at his lover.

“I’m not beautiful Hide,” Kaneki said with a small blush.

“Are you kidding me? You look like an angel that fell straight out of heaven.”

Kaneki giggled at that, his gray eyes soft, but sad, “I’m sorry Hide…”

“What for? For being beautiful because if it’s for that you shouldn’t be. I’m glad you’re the one that stole my heart.”

“No…about leaving you,” he said, blood beginning to pour from his head.

“K-Kaneki? What do you mean?” Hide asked, fear settling into his stomach. He quickly removed his jacket and went to hold it up to Kaneki’s head, “ Y-You’re bleeding! It’s   
okay, I’ll take care of it.”

But when he went to hold his jacket up to staunch the bleeding Kaneki was moving away from him and the background shifted to the hospital’s dining hall.

“I’m sorry Hide…I’m so sorry,” Kaneki was crying, his face turning red from the blood pouring down.

“It’s okay Kaneki! I promise, I’m going to protect you. We’ll get you cleaned up, everything is going to be fine,” Hide said, his voice shaking.

“No Hide…it’s not going to be fine. You’re dreaming right now.”

“No, it will be, I’ll find a way to make it that way I promise!”

“Hide…please just stop. I want you to live without me…”

“I-I can’t. I won’t! D-Don’t talk that way Neki everything’s gonna be-“Hide trailed off, his voice cracking as he saw Jason come up behind Kaneki.

“Kaneki watch out!”

“Hide! Run!” Kaneki screamed as Jason’s meaty hands clamped down around Kaneki’s neck and squeezed. Hide tried to run towards him to try to help but his legs felt like lead, they wouldn’t move no matter how hard he struggled.

“Kaneki! Kaneki!” Hide screamed.

Jason laughed, watching as Kaneki’s face turned blue before he dropped him to ground, killing him. “You’re worthless Hide and you will always be worthless. He depended on you and you failed him. Just like how Akane depended on you and you failed her. You’re a failure Hide and your existence is a mistake. Why don’t you just die already? Put the world out of its’ misery.”

“K-Kaneki?” Hide choked out, falling to his knees as he stared at Kaneki’s dead body, “No no no…this isn’t true, this isn’t true this can’t be true! He’s not gone! He can’t be gone! Kaneki!? Kaneki!? Can you hear me! Don’t you die on me! Please I can’t live without you! I’m not going to let you die like Akane! Kaneki!”

He didn’t know he had woken up at this point and was screaming Kaneki’s name at the top of his lungs, his mind was reeling and unable to tell apart the dream from reality. His body felt like it was burning, but in his core he felt cold.

“Hide!? Hide! Dude, calm down it was just a dream!” Nishiki’s voice floating through his consciousness. The group decided they would take shifts watching over Hide since the usual regular staff were not around and they didn’t trust any of the staff pulled on their unit to properly take care of Hide and his crisis. Nishiki only wished that Hide would’ve stayed asleep while he was watching over him so he could be someone else’s problem. He wasn’t exactly the best when it came to comforting someone but he tried to think about how his sister comforted him before she passed or how he would’ve liked to be comforted in his moments of grief. As he looked down at Nagachika screaming Kaneki’s name and nonsense at the top of his lungs in that broken fucking voice that tore through his heart, squirming around on the bed, his eyes blood shot and tearful, he did the one thing that came to his mind. As he listened to the nonsense spilling out of Hide’s mouth, of being cold, scared of being alone, wanting to die, he lifted up the covers on the bed and slipped in underneath them so he was beside Hide.

“Alright, alright. That’s enough man. Get over here,” Nishiki grumbled, not believing he was actually doing this as he pulled the blonde close to him and pressed the sobbing man’s head to his chest.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I should’ve done better,” Hide said in desperation, his voice muffled as his hands gripped Nishiki’s shirt like he was his only shred, his only life-line to keeping himself in reality.

“You did the best you could Chika. Just get some sleep before you fuck up your wounds. You’re not alone,” Nishiki grumbled, patting the blonde’s mess of hair awkwardly. His face twitched in disgust at how greasy it was, “Dammit I hope they don’t expect us to try and wrestle you in the shower to, these good for nothing staff.”

So, Nishiki held Hide close, even after he stopped shaking and his breathing evened out, even if his hair was fucking disgusting and he really didn’t want to. He guessed he wouldn’t be any better if the roles were reversed and it was Kimi who was dragged to who knows where, heavily injured, with nothing to tell him whether or not she was alive or dead. It would drive him fucking insane.

“You better not tell anyone this, I have a reputation to uphold you know,” the man grumbled before he also dozed off. He had a couple hours until his shift was over.

~

“Kay, so how should we do this?” came Nishiki’s voice, his chest vibrated against Hide’s face and he could hear his heart beat. While he felt warmer, it still couldn’t unthaw the cold slowly spreading out from the core of his body, it still didn’t make him feel any less numb. The pounding in his head was dull and so was the pain in his leg for right now, but his head still felt stuffed with cotton and he had a hard time registering the context of what people were saying. He found it hard to focus.

“It might be easier to see if they could call Yomo over, maybe he’s working on another unit…” Yoriko suggested.

“Why the hell is he over on another unit? If he’s here, then they should’ve placed him over here! The pull staff we have here are useless!” came Nishiki’s voice.

“There was a lot of injuries from yesterday Nishiki…”

“That’s still no excuse! Whatever see if Yomo will come over, I have a feeling this kid isn’t going to shower willingly.”

“On it,” Touka responded before she walked out of the room, that was one of the perks of having an uncle who worked at the hospital you were admitted in. All she had to do was throw a fit or say she desperately needed Yomo and he’d be there at the drop of a hat. While Touka left the room with Yoriko, Shuu stood there smiling smugly at NIshiki.

“I never knew you had a heart Nishiki…”

“Can it you pompous asshole. He was having a mental breakdown and I didn’t know what else to do. He’s been complaining of being cold and alone,” was his reply.

After a few moments of silence Shuu asked, “Has he drank or ate anything?”

“No, and I don’t plan on feeding him or helping him drink. I’ll help stick him in the shower but that’s as far as I’ll go.”

Hide wanted to say no. He wanted to run away and go hide in a corner. He didn’t want to eat. He didn’t want to drink. He didn’t want to shower or move from bed. He wanted sleep the days away before he succumbed to dehydration or starvation, whatever came first. He didn’t find the energy in his body to move though and no matter how hard he tried to focus on what they were planning, it got lost and forgotten.

“Yomo’s coming over,” Touka responded.

“Ya hear that Chika? You’re taking a shower whether you want one or not. We can do it the hard way or the easy way, your choice,” Nishiki threatened, pulling away to take a look at Hide’s face, “I don’t like the look of that…”

Hide’s amber eyes stared ahead, soulless and broken and Nishiki could easily see that nothing he said had taken root into his head. The Hide that they knew when he was first admitted was no longer there and if Nishiki was being honest, it kind of scared the shit out of him to see someone with such an annoyingly bright attitude be reduced to this.

“What are you talking about?” Touka asked as she stepped over to take a look at Hide’s face, “Oh…”

Yoriko whimpered and looked about ready to cry at how…well dead Hide looked.

It took several minutes before Yomo arrived, his eyebrow raised in surprise and in a question when he saw the group congregate in Hide and Kaneki’s room. Nishiki sat beside Hide which took a few minutes to accomplish since Hide had an iron grip on his shirt. He made sure Hide stayed awake by flicking him lightly on the forehead, refusing to drag a passed out Hide to the showers.

“Thanks for finally joining us. Since no one else here wants to do anything, we were hoping you could help us get Hide in the shower-“

“And give us any information on Kaneki,” Yoriko interrupted Touka in a hopeful tone.

“I will help you, but I also have no information on Kaneki,” the man responded with a defeated sigh. He wouldn’t admit it to anyone, but he looked tired.

“Alright Shuu, you ready?” Nishiki asked as he pushed Hide into a sitting position. Yomo walked over and picked up Hide bridal style easily like he was a sack of potatoes before leading the way to the bathroom. Touka, Kanae, and Yoriko stayed in the room, while Shuu picked out a change of clothes for Hide among his “atrocious taste in clothing”. Hide felt his muscles tense up a little bit, but he couldn’t make his mind connect to his body to jump out of Yomo’s arms and run off. Yomo unlocked the door with one hand before swinging open the door and setting Hide on the toilet seat.

Nishiki was surprised to see no struggle out of Hide and thought that perhaps this wouldn’t be as bad as he thought it would be. It was until they stripped Hide, set him down onto the shower floor and turned on the water that he started to scream bloody murder and struggle like his ass was on fire. If you would’ve asked Nishiki, he would’ve never thought he’d have to hold another naked man down with some fucking purple haired twat as they bathed him against his will. He never thought that someone in Hide’s state of mind and body would be able to struggle or scream so much and he was afraid that the stitches on his thigh would pop open because of it.

It wasn’t the temperature of the water that made Hide scream and struggle, no instead of seeing water coming out of the shower head, he saw blood raining down on him. The sound of the water coming down was so overwhelmingly loud that he wanted to get away. He couldn’t deal with how distorted the world had gotten. The words that accompanied people’s voices were hard to concentrate on, hard to register, the smallest noise seemed so loud, and the colors of the world were fading to gray. He was familiar with how the world felt after Akane’s death, but this world was so much worse. Everything overwhelmed him, everything hurt, and sleep was only a temporary solution.

They only did as much as they had to in order to make sure Hide was sufficiently clean. When they turned the water off Hide looked like a nearly drown cat. He was shivering, whether from fear, anger, or cold, Nishiki didn’t know, but he felt a weird sense of accomplishment that he only got a half-soaked shirt and a couple bruises on his arm from all this. Once they helped Hide dry off and get fresh clothes on he returned to his blank stare into the void.

“Welp, it’s been real. Your turn Shuu,” Nishiki said as he ran off, leaving Yomo to carry Hide back to his room with Shuu tagging along behind him, sporting a bruise on his cheek from when Hide struck out at him during the entire ordeal.

~

“Monsieur you must eat. Kaneki would want you to. We may not know how he is, but I know he is strong and will make it through.”

It’s been a couple of hours since he was forced into his shower and his hair was already back to it’s dry, fluffy state. Shuu was given a bowl of soup to try and force down Hide’s throat, but Shuu wasn’t familiar with taking care of someone, he was used to being taken care of. If it was for Kaneki’s sake, he was willing to make sure his ray of sunshine stayed alive. In the beginning he loathed Hide and was jealous that Hide managed to get so close to Kaneki without even trying. It took Shuu a whole month to even get Kaneki to properly talk to him, but even then, he didn’t glow so bright like he did when Hide was around. It was like he turned into a different, better person. Since he learned of Kanae’s feelings, the jealousy had dimmed a little bit, but it was until he had to sit there, unable to do anything and listen to Hide struggle so violently, screaming his name over and over that he realized just how much Hide loved Kaneki.

“I could hold his nose, so he’d have to open his mouth,” Kanae offered.

“That sounds so harsh Kanae. I do not wish to hurt the sunflower in such a fragile state. I wish to nurture him.”

“Sometimes you need to use force to nurture someone who has lost the will to thrive. We have to at least try.”

Hide continued to stare off into space. All he knew was that the soup made his stomach turn at the smell of it or any food for that matter. He wanted to be left alone so he could pass away in peace! The world was either white noise or people’s muffled voices, or it was screaming and pain so violent that he left him shaking. Hide never thought that he could become so depressed and for a moment he thought maybe Jason might’ve slammed his head so hard he fucked up his senses. Hide felt his chest constrict in fear when he felt someone pinch his nose, which only elevated when he opened his mouth on instinct to continue to breathe and something was shoved in it. Hide would’ve spat it out, but another hand was holding his mouth shut and it freaked him out because he couldn’t breathe, but he also didn’t want to swallow, so he began to try and struggle. He hated how hard it was to just simply stop breathing and how scary it was when you couldn’t breathe. It was pathetic, this body of his. It no longer decided it wanted food or water, why couldn’t it just go one step further and decide it no longer needed oxygen?

“Swallow monsieur.”

So, Hide was forced to swallow the mouthful of soup, a shiver wracking his body as he felt the warmth spread through his insides. It wasn’t enough to get rid of the cold spreading throughout him, but it did help to make it more endurable. Even though his stomach cramped and felt heavy at the feeling of something filling in after god knows how long, he liked the feeling of some warmth going through him. It took a couple of times of having his nose pinched to make his feeble mind register that he had to open his mouth in order to get more of this warming substance, but afterwards he found he could move his body if it involved something simple. Open mouth, close mouth, chew, swallow food, repeat. Open mouth, close mouth, chew, swallow food, repeat. It was like his body was waking up a little bit, not enough for him to fight off this heavy daze that took over him, but it lifted a little bit.

Shuu seemed to see this and smiled softly at Hide, “I would not have been able to do this without you Kanae”

“I didn’t do much Master Shuu,” Kanae said with a small blush.

Before Shuu knew it, Hide had finished the whole bowl of soup, but Hide had gotten so used to the repetitive muscle movement that he still opened his mouth for more. It took a few moments for Hide’s body to register that there wasn’t anymore food, so he slowly closed his mouth, feeling the heavy blanket of depression cover over him again. It was a little depressing to see Hide crawl back into his blank, unmoving state, but Shuu was happy that he had peeled back the veil a little bit. He never thought he would actually help bathe or feed someone, especially of someone of his standards, but it felt strangely nice to help out a friend in need.

Once they saw to it that the food settled in Hide’s stomach, the two of them helped Hide lay down and watched over him as he continued to rest, their muffled conversations lulling him into sleep where he saw Kaneki.

~

The second nightmare made Hide turn into a violent beast. He couldn’t remember a lot of it, all he knew was that it was dark, and his arms and legs were restrained and no matter how hard he fought he couldn’t break free. Kaneki’s tortured screaming was playing over and over, echoing around him to the point he couldn’t pin point where he was. The screaming was so loud it hurt his ears and no matter how loudly he yelled back he couldn’t scream loud enough for Kaneki to hear him. When he woke his skin was burning with a raging fever, Shuu and Nishiki were holding down the upper half of his body while Touka and Kanae were holding his legs down.

“What happened?” came Yomo’s voice.

“He just started screaming and swinging his arms and legs around. I think he has a fever,” Shuu reported, blood was dripping from his nose. The two men grunted when Hide began to struggle harder, his amber eyes bright with delirium and his cheeks dark red with fever. He ignored them in favor of staring ahead because he saw Kaneki standing in the doorway, excitement and desperation filling him up so much that he thought he was going to explode. He wanted to touch him, he needed to know this wasn’t a dream.

“Kaneki! Kaneki! Help me! Kaneki!” Hide shouted, Shuu looked towards where Hide’s eyes were focused and found nothing was there, he looked back with a sympathetic look.

“Hide nothing is there! You have a fever, you’re hallucinating!”

But Hide didn’t listen to him. He didn’t care that there weren’t bandages on Kaneki’s face, that he was standing without difficulty or that he was smiling serenely at him, no trace of pain on his face. He needed to see for himself! The violence really started in when Kaneki shimmered away and was replaced with Jason sneering down at him. Unbridled rage filled him, his eyes burning red. When he looked around, instead of seeing his friends, he saw Jason’s holding him down.

“Get the hell off of me! Die already! This is your fault!” Hide screamed the cords in his neck and the veins in his arms popping up under the skin with how hard he was struggling.

“Dammit, I can’t hold onto him much longer. He’s out of it,” Nishiki warned, growling when Hide dug his fingernails into his arm.

“I got something to sedate him, just keep him still a little longer. The wound on his thigh is infected,” came Yomo’s voice, “Let’s try and turn him on his side.”

It took all of them to force the man screaming bloody murder onto his side so Yomo could pull up Hide’s pant leg to examine the inflamed, burning red skin that surrounded the stitches on his thigh. He first injected the sedative to calm the writhing blonde, spitting venomously at his peers, his eyes flashing with animalistic rage and his nose flaring. In a matter of moments, he felt his muscles loosen and the rage leave Hide’s face.

Nishiki was the first to remove his hand-on Hide, inspecting the scratch marks on his arm, “Damn Chika is fucking vicious when he wants to be.”

“Kill me…I want to die…kill me…kill me…kill me…please kill me…I can’t take it…it hurts…it hurts I want to die…” Hide began to choke out, his eyes stared blankly ahead, but tears were pouring like a torrent from them, “Take me with him…”

Touka looked away, unable to stomach looking at Hide. Out of all of them, she was the one whose been at the hospital the longest and it wasn’t because her only living, adult, relative worked here. She’s been admitted multiple times for many different reasons, mostly revolving around her eating disorder that she just couldn’t seem to get rid of. She was the first ‘somewhat’ friend of Kaneki’s and she was here when he was first admitted as a thirteen-year-old. They didn’t do much. They mostly made small talk and usually sat together in their rooms when they were on the adolescent ward to chase off loneliness. When Touka was discharged and had been gone for a couple of years before landing herself back into the hospital, Kaneki had changed. No longer was she allowed to talk with him privately. His breakdowns were frequent, and he gained the reputation of being too dangerous, too weird, and too scary to be approachable.

As she watched Hide’s own descent into madness, she felt like she was watching what Kaneki must’ve went through. Was the loneliness that much for him? So much that he couldn’t bear to stay in reality? It seemed a little stupid that Kaneki would’ve affected him so deeply in just two months that he would be reduced to this. She supposed that it just depended on how much faith, how much you invest into someone that made or broke someone. Kaneki lost everything he had and when he came here his only hope, his only shred of sanity was through Touka. When Touka left, he lost that remaining shred. Hide nearly lost everything being admitted. Then he lost the thin thread that connected him to his parents and lost his apartment while being admitted here. The last thing he had was Kaneki, the only way he could look at the future was through Kaneki, and even though they only knew each other for two months they were both desperate enough to latch onto anything that could hold them together. Maybe that’s why they worked so well together, Touka thought to herself. She really didn’t know. It’s not like she could judge though. If it was Yoriko that was in the hospital, Touka would be worried sick about her to.

“It hurts…It hurts….It hurts,” Hide continued to sob like a broken record. Touka tried to ignore it, she had to stay strong, she saw how badly it was affecting Yoriko. She’s always been so soft and kind hearted and she needed Touka to be her rock. She tried not to focus on Yomo trying to clean up the infected wound. She tried to focus on the positive. Kaneki was strong, and she had faith that if he had managed to escape from Jason the first time with all his injuries, then he had a chance he could make it through a second time. Even if it was a slim chance.

Once Yomo finished cleaning the wound and Hide stopped muttering to himself in favor of whimpering, Nishiki left to go to his therapy session, while Shuu and Kanae rested from their shift of watching over Hide. It was Touka and Yoriko’s turn again. Touka grabbed a cold compress for Hide’s fever while Yoriko decided she would try to do what Nishiki did and climbed in bed with Hide. She wrapped her arms around him and rested her chin on the back of his head, softly shushing him as she watched Touka set the cold compress against his forehead. Touka rolled her eyes, but decided that she would join her, even if the bed was quite small and barely fit the three of them. It was a lot more comfortable than sitting on a chair until Nishiki came to take over. Touka pressed Hide’s face against her like a mother would when attempting to comfort a child. She reached her arms to wrap around Yoriko as well in hopes of offering some comfort to the empathetic woman.

“Do you really think Kaneki will be okay?” Yoriko whispered once she was sure Hide had fallen asleep.

“Of course. I know that he will,” Touka lied. She wanted to keep her fears to herself. Yoriko seemed pleased with her answer and closed her eyes to drift off into sleep. Of course, she would be. She trusted Touka in all her judgements, even though Touka wished she wouldn’t. As Touka closed her eyes she promised herself that if Kaneki even thought about dying, wasting all of their efforts to make sure his stupid boyfriend stayed alive, she was going to summon his spirit just so she could kick his ass.


	13. Chapter 13

Together the group found their watch over Hide become as routine as attending their therapy sessions. It became a part of their daily lives, even if the staff disapproved of it because of the mass amounts of paperwork that would be in their wake because of abuse reports. Nishiki told them to kiss his ass, apparently being on the short end of the stick when it came to be being injured around Hide. The guy was sporting a bunch of bruises on his face and arms and scratches, most of them small but there were a few bigger ones on his arms.

In about a week Irimi came back, looking exhausted and apologetic that they took taking care of Hide into their own hands. She offered that since she was back she could take care of him, but the group was strangely protective of Hide and told her that if things got too out of hand they’d let her know. It was a little calming that they had someone familiar other than Yomo around. They tried to grill Irimi for information over Kaneki but was frustrated to learn that she had also been kept in the dark. All she knew was that he was taken away to a different hospital to be watched over and nobody knew when he would be returning, if at all. They were hesitant of placing Kaneki back in the same building with Jason. Originally, they thought if they placed them on different units that they would be okay, but after this incident they thought it might be better if one of them went to a separate facility.

Over the week Hide had grown progressively worse. Nishiki, Shuu, and Yomo were the ones that handled taking Hide to the bathroom and making sure he was clean on top of doing their normal shift. When they weren’t doing those things, they were off in their rooms or somewhere close just in case. Touka and Yoriko handled making sure Hide ate or drank something. Yomo and Irimi made sure Hide’s wounds were cleaned, that he took his medications and helped calm him during his episodes. Nobody wanted to leave the unit for longer than necessary, especially Yomo and Irimi.

The episodes Hide had grew more frequent and began to creep into hours he was awake and staring at the wall. His hallucinations didn’t stop at Kaneki or Jason, they began to include his parents and Akane. Hide had screamed so much that his voice sounded hoarse and cracked frequently, not that he spoke anything coherent these days anyways. Over the days Hide began to eat less and less and whatever they did feed him sometimes came back up if he was especially anxietal. They tried giving him music to listen to, they gave him the heavy blanket Kaneki had from his blanket. Shuu tried to sing to him, Yomo tried aroma therapy, which worked for awhile but soon he was back to screaming out his lungs. The group have gotten used to laying down beside Hide during their shifts, finding that the blonde found the most comfort knowing there was someone beside him.  
Everyone had their own way of comforting him. Yoriko loved to cuddle and enjoyed playing with his fluffy hair or rubbing his back. She loved to cook and talked about all the things she was going to make when she got discharged. Touka was usually with Yoriko so she let Yoriko do most of the talking as the two of them took either side of Hide and wrapped their bodies around him like a cocoon. Nishiki preferred to lay down behind Hide, laying an arm and a leg acrossed him, that is, once he got over the awkwardness of sharing the same bed as another man. Shuu liked to lay behind Hide and sing softly to him while running his fingers through his hair. While he thought his fashion sense was a disaster, he loved his hair and how fluffy it is. Kanae preferred to lay down with Shuu and wrap their arms around the two of them and silently listen to his master’s singing, sometimes Shuu managed to get Kanae to join in.

While none of them were Kaneki, Hide found some sense of comfort with being held. It was like it was preventing him from fully coming a part. Even though his skin was burning with a constant fever, he felt the cold inside of him spread further as every hour passed but having someone else’s body heat to leech off from seemed to make it more bearable. He hated the cold, always had. He thrived on the summer heat and the sunshine beating off his body. He thrived on flowers and trees in full bloom, the colors of fireworks bursting in the air during the fireworks festivals in the summer. When Kaneki left, he not only took his heart away, he took his summer away, he took his oxygen away, his sense of music away, and his sense of time away.

By the next week Hide was connected to an IV and drugged out of his mind, the group still tried to encourage him to eat and drink, only getting him to eat little bits at a time. Marude and Uta visited him on separate occasions, Marude mostly to try and instill encouragement while Uta sat silently and stared at the dark, sickly colors surrounding Hide’s form. The blues and greens that hid close to his body were now in full bloom with some black surrounding his body. All the bright colors that surrounded him when he was around Kaneki were gone. What a beautiful tragedy, Uta thought to himself. I think I know what mask will suit you Mr. Nagachika. A scarecrow mask. The scarecrow had two symbolic meanings as a dream symbol. In a positive light it was seen as a symbol of hope and prosperity. Uta saw this when Kaneki began to hang out with Hide, hope and prosperity were given to him. Together they gave each other hope and prosperity. In a negative light, the scarecrow is seen as a symbol of death and fear, which was what Hide was facing now.

As he watched the blonde quake under the covers, his eyebrows drawn together and his eyes rolling around agitatedly behind his closed eyelids, Uta was reminded of the time he sat in Kaneki’s room. He had heard of the rumors surrounding him and his interest was piqued, but instead of finding someone who was dangerous and unpredictable, he saw a pathetic, sniveling, tragic little boy desperate for someone to love him. Yes, Kaneki was dangerous and unpredictable which Uta soon found out when he tried to strangle him, but it was merely a mask. An aggressive strong front to hide who he truly was. A mask Uta found that most people put on. He was intrigued to see someone like Hide who put on a mask of happiness, of positivity.

“I hope that Kaneki returns to you, it would be quite a shame to see this come to an end so soon after the beginning. That makes for crap storytelling you know,” Uta said, a small smile touching his lips.

A couple of days later, Hide was silent and hard to get a response out of. Shuu was sure that Hide was going to die, but when he voiced his opinion he got a hard slug on the arm from Touka and a dirty look from Nishiki. They didn’t want to admit it, but they were thinking the same way. It didn’t matter how hard they tried, they were just fighting off the inevitable. They still kept silent vigil over the resting man. His face pale, gaunt and lifeless. It infuriated Touka that there still wasn’t any information on Kaneki, or if there was, they were hiding it for reasons she didn’t know of. Even if he was dead, she still wanted to know, at least to end this waiting game.

It was nearing the end of the day when the unit doors finally opened to reveal a skinny, haggard looking Kaneki staggering in with two staff at either side. Bandages were wrapped around his head and one of his skinny arms was wrapped around his torso as he breathed shallowly. He looked thoroughly annoyed that he had to be escorted by two staff like he was some dangerous criminal. Sure, he knew he was quite the difficult patient over the past two weeks, but he figured anyone would be after waking up in a different hospital with no idea what happened to your love after you blacked out because your head was bashed how many times into a freaking wall. It didn’t help that no matter how many times he asked that nobody gave him a straight answer, all he got was “Everything is fine.” “Don’t worry about it!”. He didn’t want a simple “Hide is fine”, he wanted to know if he was sleeping okay, was he eating properly, was he hurting? He wanted to know where Jason was and whether or not Jason hurt him as badly as he did him. The fact that he didn’t get   
an elaboration made him worry more because those were the type of answers that spelled out “Nothing is okay, but we’re lying to you, so you don’t freak out more.”

“Kaneki?” Irimi blurted out from behind the nurse’s desk after she regained some of her composure, shock and joy on her face as she walked on from behind the desk and walked down the hall. Yomo walked out from the med room and stopped, his eyes widening in recognition.

“Oh my god. We’re so glad you’re okay,” Irimi breathed, trying not to get emotional because that would be unprofessional, but she couldn’t help it. She had taken care of Kaneki and had known him since he’d been admitted and saw him as if he was her own child. Irimi wiped at her eyes and pulled the whitette into a hug, glaring at the other two staff who took the hint and walked off the unit.

“Kaneki!?” Yoriko yelped joyfully as she made a mad dash down the hall to make sure she wasn’t seeing things.

“Oh, thank fucking god,” Touka breathed, a smile on her lips, “I told you he’d be okay.”

“Amore! Monsieur! We’re so happy your alive!” was Shuu’s response, Kanae stood smiling next to him.

“Uhm…thanks guys,” Kaneki responded uncertainly, a light pink dusting his cheeks from all the attention. He felt his heart hammering away at his chest. Where was that familiar half-dyed, blonde, messy, fluffy hair of Hide’s at? Why wasn’t he running full speed at him, threatening to send them both into the nearest wall?  
“Where’s Hide?” Kaneki asked, his stomach dropping as he registered the look of joy on everyone’s faces turn somber. He felt a lump catch in his throat, “He’s not…He’s not dead is he?”

“No of course not! But he’s not in the best of shape either,” Touka responded, “He got really depressed and worried about you. He thought that you were never coming back…”

“We tried everything we could to help him get better, but he’s just been getting worse and worse,” Yoriko continued tearfully.  
Kaneki ignored them and the ache of his head pounding and his ribs protesting in favor of rushing towards their room. He halted sharply when he reached the entrance, the room was dark but he could make out Nishiki sitting in the chair next to Hide who was curled up under heavy blankets, an IV tube running underneath them. Kaneki was familiar with them both during his time here.

“Shuu, it’s your shift already?” Nishiki questioned with a yawn, looking up and pausing mid yawn when he saw Kaneki standing in the doorway.

“Dude, is this for real?”

“How is he?”

“Mostly unresponsive. Won’t eat. Won’t drink. Can’t keep things down for very long. Won’t sit up. Drugged up because without them he’d be a screaming wreck,” Nishiki said bluntly before his voice softened, “Welcome back. Sorry we couldn’t throw you a party, this one kind of kept us busy.”

“Thank you for taking care of him, but Irimi and Yomo could’ve-“

“A lot of staff were injured with Jason. We wanted to be make sure he’d stay around long enough for you to come back, if you ever did.”

“They didn’t tell you?”

“Not a damn thing,” Nishiki said in affirmation as he moved from his seat to let Kaneki have it,” How are you feeling?”

“He busted up my head pretty good. First week I was in ICU. Some internal bleeding and a couple of broken ribs. What about Hide?” Kaneki asked as he sat down in the chair and grabbed Hide’s hand. It was cold. He looked over his face carefully, noticing how gray his skin looked, his eyes sunken in their eye sockets, his lips dry and cracked. His hair looked dull and brittle.

“Stab wound on the thigh. Concussion. Probably a strained muscle or two. After you fell unconscious Hide lost his shit and started to attack Jason relentless, almost stabbed him to death with eating utensils. Hide was sedated and Jason was taken back to his unit.”

“Is he dead?”

“Not sure. I hope so.”

“Do you think you could get me something to give to him? I’m going to try and get him to wake up.”

Nishiki nodded and left the room, leaving the two of them alone, where Kaneki began to let his tears fall.

“Oh my god Hide, I’m so sorry I did this to you. I shouldn’t have stayed to fight Jason, we should’ve ran right back here,” Kaneki sobbed as he caressed the other’s face, “I should’ve fought with them at the hospital to let me call you, to let you know I was okay.”

Kaneki leaned forward to press his forehead against Hide’s, looking up when he saw Yomo walk in the room to check on his IV and to hold back a little on the drugs that were making him sleep.

“I’m warning you, when he wakes up he might not be very happy. He’s been hitting out at us and hallucinating,” the man said as he checked Hide’s vital signs.

“Is it because of his head injury?”

“Could be, though I think it’s more psychological.”

The room fell into silence as Kaneki watched Yomo finish checking over Hide before leaving the room. His absence wasn’t felt for very long though because Nishiki walked in with a bowl of broth. Kaneki caught the sight of some pretty big scratches and bruises on his arms.

“Sorry-“ he started.

“Don’t be. He didn’t mean it,” Nishiki said, watching as Hide’s body began to twitch, slowly becoming more alert.

“Do you want me to stay here in case he freaks out at you?”

“Sure,” Kaneki said. As much as he would love some alone time with Hide, he wasn’t sure how he was going to be when he woke up. With his own injuries that still needed time to heal, he didn’t want to exacerbate them. He leaned forward so he was close to Hide’s face, his thumb stroking the back of his eyelid.

“Hide…? Hide…can you wake up for me?”

Hide’s face twitched, slowly feeling himself rise to the surface. He whined as he began to feel the aches and pains on his body coming back and felt the cold again.

“No,” he croaked.

“Hide you have to wake up, at least for a little bit.” Kaneki whispered, running his hand through Hide’s hair

“Noooo. Go away…you’re not real,” Hide whined his hand coming up to clutch at his head.

“Baby, I’m right here. Open your eyes and talk to me,” Kaneki said, keeping his voice even as he tried to keep Hide from pulling out his hair.

“No!” Hide screamed, his voice sounding rough as he pulled back violently, shoving Kaneki’s hand away, “You’re not real! Leave me alone!”

Nishiki grabbed Hide before he could push himself off the bed and pushed him up so that he was sitting up, with Hide voicing his displeasure as he writhed around in his grip, screaming his head off about demons touching him.

“Demon? Please enough with the flattery. Ouch you know that fucking hurts! Oi enough you’re going to pull your IV out!” Nishiki shouted, hissing when Hide tried to attack his face. He grabbed both of his hands and pinned them down to his sides, waiting for the blonde to calm down, which was quick due to his malnourishment. As Hide sat, breathing harshly, his eyes in narrow slits as he woke up and began to stare off into space, not registering that Kaneki was there beside him and watching the whole scene go down.  
Kaneki crept forward, lowering so he could peer up into Hide’s eyes, his chest constricting when he saw how blank they looked. In a few moments time they widened at the sight of Kaneki in fear and Hide began to struggle again, thinking that Kaneki was a hallucination. Nishiki held him steady, watching him carefully for any signs that he was going to try and lash out at Kaneki.

“Hide…shhh it’s okay. I’m real…it’s okay baby, I’m right here and I’m not going to go anywhere,” Kaneki said as he slowly came closer to Hide who tried to back further away, his eyes staring at him warily. Kaneki stopped when he was in front of his face, making sure Hide was watching as he grabbed his hand and slowly rested it against his face. It killed him to see the way Hide was staring at him, like he was seeing a ghost, and he wondered just how bad his hallucinations were to be this fearful towards him.  
Kaneki let go of Hide’s hand as he began to move on its own, touching his lips, his nose, his hair and the bandages that lay there. He leaned forward slowly so he could rest his forehead against Hide who began to whimper as his scent hit his nose. This was Kaneki, in the flesh. He was alive, he was breathing, and he was here beside him. It was no hallucination. Hide felt the cold inside him begin to thaw out, breathing shakily, scared to blink in fear that this was all a dream.

“It’s okay sweetheart. Everything is okay now. It sounds like you had a rough couple of weeks to, huh?” Kaneki chuckled, his eyes filling with tears as he saw those amber eyes look at him, filled with exhaustion, but at least they didn’t look so lifeless now. Kaneki let Hide fall into him, holding him and rocking him back and forth as heart wrenching sobs were ripped out of Hide. Hide tried to talk, but it was all incoherent with how hard Hide was sobbing. Kaneki doubted he could be very comforting because he was crying just as hard. 

Nishiki found this to be extremely awkward, so he left the room, although he was rubbing at his eyes when he left.

Hide was the first to tire out, leaning heavily against Kaneki and threatening to fall back asleep. Kaneki was determined to get him to eat though, so he shook him gently to keep him awake, promising they could fall asleep after he was finished eating the broth Nishiki brought. Hide whined, but Kaneki wasn’t falling for it and managed to get him to eat at least half before he started to doze off, unable to stay awake any longer.

Kaneki guided him to lay down on the bed and laid down next to him, running his hands through his hair and humming to him softly. He was glad to see Hide’s shivering had begun to stop, his face smoothed over and peaceful for the first time in two weeks. Kaneki felt his own eyes grow heavy, forgetting how much sleep he had also lost with the nightmares that had plagued his mind about Hide. While they were far from out of the woods at the moment, he figured they were at a good start. A start. After their experience however, Kaneki was desperate to get the hell out of this hospital as soon as possible and he doubted that them being on their best behavior was going to get them discharged sooner. Jason was still alive and still in this very building they were in and Kaneki had all intentions of getting out here before Jason had time to strike again.


	14. Chapter 14

It took about a week before Hide had enough strength to walk around by himself again and though he still had some weight to gain back, his skin held a healthy glow again. Leading up to the week Hide had whined and complained about being woken up to eat or to walk around, but one stern look from Kaneki was enough to shut him up and obey. Hide was slowly getting back to the way he used to be but had grown to be wary about being outside the unit. He half expected Jason to pop up around the corner to try and finish what he started. Kaneki didn’t blame him and found himself feeling anxietal when he stepped off the unit and refused to go anywhere without Hide or another staff by his side.  
Hide and Kaneki had started back up on their therapy sessions. Since he hadn’t been keeping up with his work and felt he wouldn’t be able to catch back up, Hide decided to quit college until he got his life back on track. As he felt the fog that hung over him over the past two weeks lift, his mind was whirring, and he was coming up with a plan to get Kaneki and himself out of here. This place was too dangerous for the two of them to be in here with Jason possibly still alive and kicking. Jason managed to break out of the unit he was in, the unit that was supposed to have the most security in the whole entire hospital, whose to say he wouldn’t manage again? He was sure that once Jason figured out that Kaneki and Hide were still around, he would be thirsting for revenge and Hide didn’t want to stick around to find out if Jason could get out a second time.

While taking a shower Hide was thinking about possible ways they could get out here and which route would be safer for the two of them. He’d also have to figure out how he would get Kaneki’s medications, he couldn’t just up and quit them after all or it could have dangerous side effects. He’s been on the medications for too long. He didn’t exactly trust anyone in here anyways, the closest one being Uta, but he doubted he would be willing to help them escape from here. Maybe he could hit up one of his old friends and see if they knew where they could get psychiatric drugs? Where would they even go? Perhaps he could break into his parent’s house and try and figure out where they put his stuff? Maybe steal some money? What about his phone? No, he’ll have to ditch it, they could track him on it. They’d have to change their names…he’d have to dye his hair and probably dye Kaneki’s…

As he walked back to their room, fully clothed, drying his hair Kaneki finally voiced his concern.

“You seem so spacey lately…well I mean you were like that for most of the week, but it seems like something is on your mind,” Kaneki said, “What’s up.”

“Don’t tell anyone, but I’ve been thinking of a way we could get out of here,” Hide said, creeping closer and dropping his voice to a whisper.

“Hide, how the hell-? I mean don’t get me wrong I’d like to get the hell out of here to, but we can’t just up and waltz out of here,” Kaneki whispered in shock.

“I know. I know. But I have friends out there, I remember their numbers, I’m sure they’d know a place to get your medication. Maybe they’d let us crash at their place. I can get a job, break into my old house and figure out where my parents stashed the rest of my stuff. We’ll change our names, dye our hair. We have to do something Kaneki, every day that passes means Jason is getting stronger. He already broke out once, he can do this again and I don’t think we’re gonna get through a second time,” the blonde responded, pleading with Kaneki to hear him out.

“Have you thought of Uta?”

“Yeah, but you don’t honestly think him, a staff member, is going to help two patients escape from a psych ward do you?”  
Kaneki bite his lip worriedly as he looked down at the ground.

“Look, I can’t promise extravagant living, at least not at first but I will work my ass off to make sure we have food and a roof over our heads. You’re good at art, you could try selling your art work! I’m sure you’re smart enough to even pass the exam to get into Kamii!”

“I don’t doubt you Hide, but we shouldn’t risk our lives trying to make it out in the real world. If we stay here, they will help us get the arrangements needed to get back out there.”

“If we stay here any longer, Jason could come back and finish the job. He managed to break out of ward 13 Kaneki! I’m not saying I don’t trust Yomo and Irimi to keep us safe, but I don’t trust the staff over on ward 13. We have to at least try. Besides, even if we’re on our best behavior they’re not going to discharge us both at the same time, Jason could be waiting for that moment to strike! Look, I got a plan on how we’ll escape, you know that newbie around here right? Roma? She wears her keys with a lobster clasp on her pants instead of shoving it in her pocket,” Hide said, sitting down in front of Kaneki on the floor, his eyes lit up in excitement. Kaneki sat and listened intently.

They would stage a break down. One of them would distract Roma in a secluded spot while the other would unhook the keys from her pants and steal them. Kaneki felt more comfortable in starting the scene rather than stealing the keys. He felt he would end up falling on his face and unravel the whole plan. After they had access to keys, they’d wait until they were allowed to leave the unit and use that opportunity to escape out of the hospital. Kaneki asked what they would do about their things, which Hide hadn’t really thought of. As much as Hide hated the thought of leaving his band t-shirts behind, he figured once they were out of this place and he had a steady job, he’d be able to get more band t-shirts in the future. Besides, Kaneki was irreplaceable. They could wear some layers under jackets so that they had more than one change of clothes, and Hide would wear the t-shirts he loved the most. Kaneki always carried his sketchbook around, so it wouldn’t look suspicious if he took it with him. As for the books, they belonged to the hospital and Hide promised that when they found out where his aunt lived, they would steal the books he left behind at her house.

“Are you sure this is going to work?”

“We have to try Kaneki. We’ll put the plan into action tomorrow. We’ll escape the next day. There are still plenty of staff out because of injuries, we have to do it while they’re still understaffed.”

“What about me pretending to have a break down? I mean what should I freak out about?”

“Pretend you’re having a panic attack over the Jason incident? I’ll psych you up for it, I promise! Besides out of the two of us, you’re the better actor.”

“If you say so…”

The two of them left it off of there, deciding to talk about something else to help ease their nerves and to avoid any suspicion. When night came however, Hide stayed wide awake as he laid beside Kaneki. Two more days. Just two more days until he’d be out of this place with Kaneki. Even though there were so many things that could go wrong, even though he had no definite plan of action, he had many plans to go off of. The medication part made him a little wary, but he figured if push comes to shove he could use his friend’s computer and figure out if there was anyone in the city that might have the same medications as Kaneki and steal from their houses or maybe he’d forge a prescription? That was really far-fetched…

“Get some sleep Hide. We got a busy two days,” Kaneki mumbled tiredly, opening one of his eyes tiredly to look at Hide who turned and blinked owlishly at him.

“Sorry, just thinking up back up plans,” Hide grinned over at Kaneki.

“It can wait until morning. I think I can handle being without my meds, they didn’t do much for me anyways.”

“I thought you said they finally found a good cocktail for you though.”

“That was a half-truth. To be honest, the voices and hallucinations stopped when you started hanging around me. I let them take the credit though. They’ve worked for so many   
years to find the perfect combination, I didn’t want them to feel like it was all for nothing.”

“Dude…what you said was romantic as fuck right now.”

Kaneki giggled, “I know, but it’s true. Now get some sleep. Let’s take it a step at a time.”

~

When the two of them woke up, they decided to wait until after breakfast before they set the ball rolling, after making sure Roma was working today of course. The two of them sat away from their peer group with Hide whispering in Kaneki’s ear, trying to help set him up for a believable panic attack. He set up scenarios for Kaneki to think about that might trigger a panic attack, though he felt a little cruel doing it. He promised he would kiss it all better once it was done and over with. Kaneki picked at his breakfast, trying to get into his actor mindset.

As they walked back to the unit, Kaneki stayed silent, his face was blank and spacey. Hide set Kaneki up at the end of one of the hallways, feeling his heart hurt a little when he saw Kaneki’s hands beginning to shake. Then the blonde ran over to get Roma.

“Oh hey Roma, I was wondering if you could help me for a second!” Hide said, approaching Roma and taking her hands into his, his eyes filling with worry and concern,” Kaneki was really spacey at breakfast today and he seems to be on the verge of having a panic attack. No matter what I do I can’t seem to calm him down! I think that thing with Jason is still bugging him! Can you help me?”

“Oh no! Of course, I’ll help!” Roma responded, her eyes bright and determined to help her patients.

“Great! I’ll lead the way,” Hide said as he took her hands before Irimi or Yomo could interfere and dragged her off to Kaneki. That was easier than I thought, is she really that gullible, he asked himself. He slowed down a bit, letting Roma take the lead as they returned to Kaneki who was clutching at his head and sobbing.

“Kaneki what’s going on honey?” Roma asked.

“It’s Jason. I’m afraid he’s going to come back and come after Hide and I,” Kaneki sobbed, his whole body shaking. Hide was concerned for a moment that he was actually having a panic attack with how good his acting was. Hide focused on Roma who had her hands on her knees, talking to Kaneki. With a steady, calm hand he reached forward. Her keys dangling precariously from the loop on her pants. He looked behind him, smiling when he saw no one was looking as he quickly, but gently pressed on the tiny lever of the lobster clasp and freed the keys from her pants. He was careful to not disturb the keys as he slipped it into his pocket and went on the other side to kneel beside Kaneki.

“Oh honey, there’s no way he can break out of ward 13! I mean, I know he did, but after what happened they wouldn’t let something like that happen again! Yomo is really good to, he’ll make sure you’ll stay safe,” Roma responded, “I could get your heavy blanket for you, I think it’s in the dryer now, would that help?

“Y-Yeah, I think so,” Kaneki sobbed.

“I’ll take him back to our room,” Hide suggested as he helped Kaneki up while Roma ran to get his blanket. When the two of them saw that she was gone, Kaneki leaned in to whisper in Hide’s ear, still keeping up the façade.

“Y-You got it?”

Hide moved away and smiled at Kaneki victoriously in response before helping him to their room. Even though he could barely fight the grin threatening to come to his face, he knew he had to make sure to play it cool, so he acted as concerned as possible, whisper sweet nothings in Kaneki’s ear. He helped him sit on their bed, just in time for Roma to return with the heavy anxiety blanket, helping to drape it over Kaneki’s shoulders. Kaneki concentrated on keeping his fake anxiety attack going a little longer and then slowly calming down to make it more believable. Kaneki nuzzled his face against Hide’s neck who began to rock him back and forth and pet his hair. It’s been awhile sense he put up a façade and he had forgotten how much energy it took out of him. By the time he was finished with his act, he really had felt like he had a panic attack.

“Do you think you got it handled?” Roma asked, uncertain if it would be a good idea to leave them or not in case Kaneki got triggered again.

“Yeah I think so. Thank you, Roma, you’ve helped a lot,” Hide chirped. A whole lot Hide thought to himself. When she left, Hide finally allowed himself to grin.

“You can come out now, she’s gone.”

“Mmm, I kind of like this. That kind of made me tired.”

“Yeah, hyperventilation does that. I seriously thought you were having a panic attack there.”

“I was about to send myself into one from it,” Kaneki laughed.

“Well either way you did amazing and I’m sorry for making you do that,” Hide said, leaning down to press a kiss to Kaneki’s forehead, “Rest, you deserve it!”  
Hide stiffened a little bit when he felt hands go searching through his pockets, relaxing when he reminded himself that it was just Kaneki who was curious about the keys and felt over each of the keys on the key ring in interest.

“Wow Kaneki, you’ll take any excuse to feel me up, won’t you?” Hide smirked cockily.

“Get over yourself Hide. Do you know which key opens what door?” Kaneki asked, smiling up at Hide.

“No. I’ll try and get a good look when one of them let’s us out for lunch.”

“Good plan. Do you think we have enough time for a nap?”

“Of course!”

“Do you think we could visit Uta one last time today to?”

“Hell yeah! But first let’s nap,” Hide said, leaning back and taking Kaneki down with him so he was resting his head on his chest. Kaneki gasped in fear, chuckling when Hide landed on the bed with a soft ‘oof’ sound. One hand was circled around Kaneki’s body, while he rested his head on his other hand.

Their nap was short-lived when they heard the sound of Roma shrieking about losing her keys and the sound of Irimi scolding her and telling her to go quickly find them. Hide moved the hand behind his head to his pocket just for peace of mind.

“Thank god she gets yelled at on a daily basis…”

“You’re telling me…I hope she’s less clumsy today though, so we can nap in peace…”

“When we get out of here, we can sleep on beds that don’t feel like you’re sleeping on a plastic table.”

~

When lunch and dinner rolled around Hide paid special attention to the key that Irimi used when leading them down to the dining hall. It took a couple of glances because of the way her hand held the key but Hide thought he got it figured out. It was the biggest of the keys out of the bunch. Throughout the day Roma bemoaned the loss of her keys, which caused Irimi to be annoyed and worried. It was never good when a staff lost their keys while on the unit. When night rolled around, the two of them looked at the set of keys together, running their fingers over them and the sharp edges. Hide already picked out the shirts he wanted to bring with him, while Kaneki took the drawings that meant the most to him down from their room. They decided to leave some up to avoid suspicion. Hide already stashed the music device Marude gave him in the jeans he was going to wear tomorrow.

“This is our ticket out of here…” Kaneki breathed.

“Yeah…”

“Think we’re gonna manage?”

“Of course.”

“You got them hidden in case they search through our rooms, tonight right?”

“Yep, but don’t ask where…”

“Oh my god Hide that’s disgusting!”

“Not there! God Kaneki get your mind out of the gutter! This isn’t prison, though it comes damn close. The key ring part was one of those stretchy ones, I have it wrapped around my leg,” Hide laughed.

“Oh thank god..” Kaneki laughed back,” What’s the first thing we’re gonna do when we get settled down out there?”

“I’ll take you and show you all the things you missed. There’s this awesome restaurant with the best burgers. When I get that first paycheck, we’ll go there and feast,” Hide said, his mouth watering at the idea of it, “God, I’ve missed those burgers over the past three months.”

“That sounds amazing. I haven’t been in a restaurant in years.”

“I’ll set some money aside to so that you can get some books.”

“As awesome as that sounds, let’s wait until after a couple of paychecks. Okay hon?”

“Alright babe.”

~

When tomorrow came, Hide and Kaneki were ready to go, exchanging nervous smiles. Hide felt his stomach sink into his stomach when he overheard Irimi talking to Yomo about thinking of cancelling off unit privileges because Roma still couldn’t find her keys.

“We looked everywhere Irimi, she probably lost them outside the unit or dropped them in the toilet knowing her,” Yomo sighed, “I already searched through the rooms. They’ll turn up sometime, I’m sure of it.”

“I hope you’re right. Honestly I can’t believe she hasn’t been fired by now…”

Hide and Kaneki went their separate ways for their therapy sessions. He tried to keep a straight face, so he didn’t look suspicious. His body was vibrating with excitement and nerves and he kept going over the route they were going to take to get out of here. He decided to avoid admissions and where the visitors walked in because they would be spotted instantly. He had found some doors that actually led to the outside, instead of one of the courtyards the hospital had. About three of them. He decided they’d walked around inconspicuously for a little bit, finding a door where no one else was around and go through there.

In Hide’s therapy session with Marude, he acted normal, deciding to talk about something that was recent, but short and sweet. He decided he would talk about his anxiety over Jason breaking out again. Outwardly, he acted like this was just an ordinary day. Inwardly, he was bidding the bull dog faced man farewell.

When lunch came around Hide went over his plan with Kaneki who agreed, finding it to be the safest way to get out. Hide mentioned about possibly throwing the keys into a bush, but Kaneki convinced him to go against that idea in case they found it and traced him back through his fingerprints.

“We’ll consider it a souvenir then, courtesy of Roma,” Hide whispered, “Shall we visit Uta after this for a little bit before heading off?”

“If that’s okay,” Kaneki smiled.

“Of course. I already said farewell to Mr. Bull Dog today.”

“He doesn’t look that much like a bull-dog…”

“You don’t know him like I do. His voice even sounds gruff like how one would sound.”

“Oh my god Hide,” Kaneki sighed, but smiled endearingly at him.

~

Hide and Kaneki tried to play it cool when they were in Uta’s office, deciding that they would just chill and listen to some music while Kaneki showed some of the drawings he did while he was in the hospital. Kaneki did most of the talking while Hide ran over the route a couple more times in his head, his mind running through the many scenarios that could go down and how they could handle them. Before they knew it, their time with Uta was up and it was time to get out of here. Finally, after three months. Before Hide left though he felt the hairs on his neck stand on end though. Something felt a little wrong, but what? Hide looked around the room one last time, his eyes catching on the newest mask on Uta’s wall. It was a burlap sack with a hat on it with the henohenomoheji face on it. Strange. Maybe that’s what was giving him goosebumps? He wasn’t sure, but when they left Uta gave them the same little smile he always gave them when they left his room, or at least that’s what Hide convinced himself. Truthfully, in his opinion it looked a little sinister, but that could’ve been his paranoia.

The two of them walked hand in hand around the hospital for a little bit, scouting out the traffic around the three doors. Hide fingered the keys in his pocket as Kaneki clutched the sketchpad to his chest. Hide still felt the hairs of his neck standing up. The sooner they got out of here, the better. They were wasting precious time. After walking around the hospital once, Hide finally decided on which door they should go to. It was the most secluded and away from rec center, classrooms, and other potential hot spots around the hospital.

“This is it Kaneki…” Hide whispered, before he looked over at Kaneki with a nervous grin, “When I open this, we’re running like hell, okay?”

Kaneki nodded, licking his lips excitedly, “Alright. Sounds good.”

Hide looked around them, his senses heightened. It was quiet within the halls and no one was around.

Hide took one last deep breath before taking Kaneki’s hand in his and squeezing it.

“Let’s go home, Kaneki.”

With that Hide took the keys from his pocket and turned it in the locker, breathing in relief when he heard a soft click and the door easily slipped open. They quickly passed through it, Hide, making sure the door shut with a soft click. Kaneki waited for Hide before the blonde pocketed the keys and they took off at a sprint, adrenaline rushing through Hide’s entire body as he put as much distance as he could behind him and the hospital. After they reached the trees that surrounded the hospital, they paused for a little bit, Hide with his ears peaked, trying to pick up any sounds of sirens or announcements being made of their escape. There was none. It was absolutely silent.

“We did it. Oh my god Hide we fucking did it!?” Kaneki squealed in disbelief.

“Don’t celebrate yet hon, this is just the beginning. We still got to find a place to lay low. I think we should move at night, they can recognize us from our clothes,” Hide said, but he was grinning from ear to ear. He didn’t expect it to be this easy, but he appreciated it because there was a lot of work that would need to be done before they would be considered fully in the clear.

Kaneki grinned back at Hide, deciding to go farther in the trees, “Let’s hurry up before they know we’re actually missing. You got an idea where we could go?”

“Yep, I got a guy I know.”

“Is that so,” a voice called out.

Hide felt his stomach drop as he slowly turned around. Coming face to face with Mr. Uta who smiled serenely at them. Run, Hide thought to him, moving backwards, ready to go-

“Wait. Don’t leave yet!” Uta called out, his hands crossed behind his back, “I have a proposal that I want to run by that might be of interest to you.”

Hide looked back behind him at Kaneki, gauging his decision. Kaneki looked pale, his eyes wide, but he shrugged his shoulders at Hide. Hide whipped his head around to look back at Uta, “What is it?”

“I want to make a deal with you. I won’t turn you in, your secret is safe with me and I’ll even steal your prescriptions if, and only if you agree to help out a special friend of mine,” Uta smiled, his head tilting as he looked from one man to the other.

“And?” Hide asked, pressing for more answers, his voice tight and guarded.

“Her name is Itori and she works at the Helter Skelter. I know you’ve been there before Hide. She’s looking for people who are good at digging up information and I’ve told   
her a lot about you Hide. You’re special. I know you are. You’ll get paid and you’ll have a roof over your head. The fact that you’re taking Kaneki with you is a plus, honestly, I’m thrilled, he’s been my most favorite client. For years it seemed like he would stay a permanent patient at the hospital. When you came along he had a future. I may be a staff member, but I don’t like to play by the rules. I couldn’t see you two leaving as discharges together. Not by a long shot. I’m glad you’ve also come to that decision. So, do you agree?” Uta asks, looking behind him as the announcement was made over the intercom, “You don’t have a lot of time left to make a decision it seems.”

Hide looked back at Kaneki who was nodding furiously, “We can trust him Hide. I know it doesn’t seem that way, but I’ve known him for years. We can trust him!”

Hide nodded back, “If you’re sure.”

Hide looked back at Uta, “We agree. Helter Skelter you said?”

“Her name is Itori. Tell her I sent you. We’ll be keeping in touch. I suggest you run and don’t stop until you get there.”

Hide nodded, his eyes roving around as he looked at the mental map in his head. Helter Skelter? Yeah. He knew the place. It was one of the last bars his high school group went at when Akane was still alive.

“Alright, let’s go Kaneki!” Hide responded, grabbing Kaneki’s hands as they saw people begin to burst through the doors. Together they sprinted as fast as they could further   
away from the hospital. As they reached the top of the hill, the two of them looked back and Uta was nowhere to be seen. Then they looked at each other, with bright smiles.

“Let’s go home,” Hide grinned.

Kaneki nodded and smiled brightly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that’s the end people! I want to thank my artists and my beta for supporting me nagachiika and bit-of-honey! I know we’ve been busy with school and stuff, but I couldn’t have done it without you guys. You guys motivated me with your beautiful artwork and I am so blessed that I have you two! You guys rock and I highly recommend that you guys, my readers, go follow their tumblrs. They are amazing people and wonderful artists! Thanks for being a part of this ride! I also want to give a shout out to the organizer of hide-big-bang and thank them for setting up this event! This is the very first fan fiction. For anyone who is still reading, there will be a sequel to this fic and we will take a look into Kaneki’s past and his thoughts! Maybe I'll even do a separate thing to explain more in depth Hide's past and his memories? Also some one-shots of the characters.


	15. Authors Note

Hey guys! It's been awhile since I've did anything related to this story...anyways I thought I'd let you guys know that I've begun to do one-shots based on Hide's past! You can find the work here https://archiveofourown.org/works/16057496/chapters/37489142

If you guys have any questions or things you're curious about learning that deals with Hide's past let me know. As for creating a sequel to this story, I am still thinking about it, I just don't have the plot figured out yet. Until then, I hope you guys will be satisfied with the one-shots I created/or will create.


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